


In These Dark Moments

by MuhBeez



Series: Mr. Bone's Wild Ride [2]
Category: Undertale (Video Game)
Genre: F/M, So much angst, but expect a lot of angst, will tag as I go
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-07-25
Updated: 2018-04-24
Packaged: 2018-07-26 05:49:19
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 7
Words: 49,577
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7562773
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MuhBeez/pseuds/MuhBeez
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sans's POV, for the story of In These Quiet Moments. Starts from the beginning of the original story - based on Pacifist ending.</p><p>I *highly* recommend reading all of ITQM before you read this second piece, as this will create spoilers for the main story otherwise!</p><p>(Original story here! http://archiveofourown.org/works/6101256/chapters/13985562 )</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * Translation into Polski available: [Te mroczne momenty](https://archiveofourown.org/works/9211466) by [YumiMizuno](https://archiveofourown.org/users/YumiMizuno/pseuds/YumiMizuno)



Sans was displeased.

Displeased was probably the simplest thing you could say about it. Once again the nightmares started, and once again he pleaded to Papyrus to ship off somewhere else - somewhere far away from their cause. While their town was not exactly the best, and certainly not monster-friendly, Papyrus had finally begun to settle down and make friends (as he did). Thanks to the disgusting amount of racism, finding a job had been nigh impossible for him; Sans was luckier on the other hand, he was able to elbow his way into jobs somehow without too much complaint. Whether it was his short stature and easy-going nature, or his ability to keep his voice to an 'indoor level', it made things simpler for when he needed to up and leave. Papyrus technically couldn't complain, considering Sans had been supporting them both since they came above ground.

He'd put a decent amount of research into moving this time, thankfully. A few thousand miles away from the problem, in a completely different part of the states, and somewhere that was boasting a 'monster-friendly community'. He'd heard that before; it generally didn't pan out. But this time, it was a city. A  _different_ city. And from what he understood, it was a progressive place in it's attempts to make everyone feel comfortable, from human to monster. He knew a few of the other monsters had actually relocated there, but unfortunately didn't know them too well - so he couldn't ask them their opinion.

 

So his best bet was to roll the dice and see where they landed this time. Not that it mattered. And not that it was really random, he was pretty sure he'd wound up here before anyway. Every time he looked at his journal, his hands twitched, wanting to leaf through the pages to see what the hell was going to happen.

 

 _"don't"_ he had warned himself in it's pages. And he generally gave himself pretty good advice.

 

He had managed to secure an apartment through various phone interviews, credit checks and a hefty three month payment up front. The place looked nice online, that's for sure - it was owned by a management company so the private bias of a landlord generally had trouble creeping in. He made no mention of being a monster up until he was approved, and kept making excuses for not sending over his driver's license. When he sent the Monster Identification Card over, it was almost a week of static silence, and he was positive they were about to be rejected. He was immensely surprised when they finally got back to him, surprisingly chipper and discussed an official move in date.

Papyrus, thankfully, was taking the move positively as he always did. It made it a little less hard on Sans, who already felt responsible for all of the chaos in his brother's life. Why couldn't things just be simple?

They had gotten themselves a decent sized apartment on the third floor - nothing particularly spectacular, but exactly in their price range, and comfortable enough to fit them. Working heat, and a landlord who didn't hate them right out the gate? Sounded like a dream to him and Papyrus. As their moving van (carrying a pathetic amount of personal furniture and items) approached their new home, he began to feel oddly excited. Why on earth would he be excited about this? He couldn't get attached, he'd probably have a breakdown once again and make them move. But still, as they exited the van and stepped on the street, he took in the smells and sounds and felt oddly at home.

He'd like to have said that was new, but he knew for sure it  _wasn't_.

* * *

 

That afternoon, Papyrus and himself were moving a couch up the stairs. He had heard what sounded like one of his to-be-new neighbors going up the stairwell, and let out a silent prayer they didn't scream while the two of them were lugging furniture. He caught a glimpse of a person enter the door adjacent to theirs, when he noticed a box laying on the staircase. Ah! Looked like they had dropped one of their groceries on the way up.

"hey bro, looks like our neighbor dropped this. gonna give it back to them real quick." he said, stooping to pick it up. Papyrus suddenly was gripping the sofa with all his might to make sure it didn't slide down the stairs.

"SANS! CAN THAT WAIT? I CAN'T MOVE THIS BY MYSELF, DESPITE MY IMMENSE STRENGTH." Papyrus huffed, holding on. Sans grumbled, and began pushing the couch back up the stairs. He was frustrated - normally he could just utilize his magic and this couch wouldn't even be a problem, right? But things had changed up top, and using magic in public was an absolute no-no. With a handful of actual pushes with effort behind it, they finished getting the sofa up top, and into the apartment.

"there ya go. i'm gonna return this real quick." Sans said, holding up the box of cereal. Papyrus nodded, and began assessing the apartment as Sans shut the door behind him.

He stood in front of the door across theirs for a solid 2 minutes, staring at it. Normally they'd keep to themselves - if the past taught them anything, making yourself known to the neighbors never turned out all that great. But this  _was_ their cereal, and it would be a good way to break the ice at least. So, he knocked.

No one answered. Sans sighed, he could hear the TV blaring in the background, and he literally just watched someone enter that door. He knocked again, hoping maybe they just didn't hear it.

There was a shuffling noise behind the door, and Sans heard an extremely muted "The fuck?" emerge. Sans began to inwardly become anxious, but he slid into his comfortable grin and waited for the door to open - which it did. There stood a woman, hair tied into flop of mess that was sticking out everywhere, an oversized baggy grey t-shirt that said 'Cool Your Jets' with two jets ice-skating on it, and what he had discovered a few months ago were yoga pants. The two of them stared at each other, in a moment of uncomfortable silence.

"hey." he finally uttered, trying to grasp his usual air of confidence.

"Um. Hi?" she said, sounding extremely confused. Her eyes were flickering up and down Sans's body as she tried to visually process the information in front of her. He could tell she wasn't prepared for this, so he quickly lifted the box up in front of himself.

"you dropped this outta your bag when you were going up the stairs." Sans said, his fingers tapping on it as he waved it.  "hope it'll _cheer_ you up."

"Yeah! Cool! Thanks, umm..." she said, and Sans began to feel slightly self-conscious. He was used to this response, but for some reason it was bothering him right now. "You live here?"

Really? She didn't get the joke? Everyone loved jokes. He paused, and felt the moment of overlap. He'd done this before.

"yeah, we just moved in across the way. just me and my brother. hope you don't mind a couple of numbskulls around ya."

"No! I mean. Not at all." she replied awkwardly. She was fidgeting in the doorway, and Sans could tell she wanted to bolt. "If you ever need anything, just uh, knock. Or ring the doorbell, I'll probably actually hear that."

"sure thing." he said, extending his hand. "sans." There's no way she wouldn't get a kick out of this. As their hands connected, a loud farting noise came from the whoopee cushion he slipped into the palm of his hand when she wasn't looking. His grin widened, immensely proud of himself - instead, the woman looked even  _more_ confused.

"______. Nice to meet you. I'm.. going back inside now. Have a good night!" she said, and quickly shut the door. Shit. Way to fuck that one up, Sans. He snorted, upset with himself - that trick might work on kids and teens, but he probably should stop trying to with adults. Regardless, he at least returned the cereal, so now they couldn't be blamed for theft or cereal killing.

Heh, cereal killing. He liked that one - he made a mental note and stored it away for later. He had to help Papyrus get the remainder of the furniture into the apartment, despite his aching desire not to do so. Why wasn't a floor just as good as a bed? Or a couch? Or a dining room table? These mysteries were for another time.

 

* * *

 

Papyrus and Sans had gotten the remainder of their furniture into the apartment, as well as the boxes. There wasn't a ton, just what they salvaged from the Underground and some personal mementos. Papyrus loved keeping pictures of his adventures both below and above ground, so he had a lot of framed pictures of them and their friends. 

Unfortunately, that included the  _kid_ , so as far as Sans was concerned, the decor was lacking.

Regardless, they had settled in. They didn't have the most spectacular view, but that wasn't relevant - they had a nice place to watch the city below them without being too far away, shops across from them and a ton of crossway traffic, as it was on a main street. More exposed than he would have liked, he figured, but the landlord got them in there in a hurry with quite a few polite platitudes. The porch was actually fairly generous, which surprised him for a city apartment, and judging by their neighbor, there were close to zero regulations on what you could put on it. He looked at the lights hanging from the ceiling, wrapped around the pillars and making it extremely warm and inviting. He couldn't quite see the remainder of it, but figured there was a chair or something along those lines out there.

Papyrus was in the kitchen, getting everything organized when he thought he heard a knock on the door. He listened for a moment, but didn't hear anything else, so decided to ignore it. It wasn't until he heard Papyrus swing it open and start chattering that he realized there was actually someone there. Should he go out? What if it's some asshole human? 

_Or what if it's that girl?_

"WOWIE! THANK YOU! THAT IS SO KIND OF YOU!! COME IN!" Sans heard Papyrus exclaim, and he heaved a sigh. He guessed it was time to see who it was, or at least make sure Papyrus wasn't about to get into some sort of trouble.

"hey bro, what's all the commotion about?" Sans rounded the corner and saw an overly happy brother fawning over the next door neighbor, and her standing there with a huge container of cookies looking _extremely_ awkward. "oh. hey neighbor." 

"Hi Sans!" she said, her voice chipper. Was she actually glad to see him? He surmised not, it was likely nerves. "I just wanted to welcome you guys so.. I made these for you." She gestured to the container she was holding - probably food of some sort? Sans was curious, he knew it was a monster custom to welcome people to the neighborhood if anyone relocated, but it just didn't happen often. Did humans share the same trait?

"ISN'T THAT FANTASTIC? WE ALREADY HAVE A MUCH NICER NEIGHBOR THAN BEFORE! THIS IS SO GREAT BROTHER!" Papyrus said, his voice warbling. Sans shot a look at Papyrus, hoping to god he was right about this one. The human woman was shifting from foot to foot, and he wondered for a moment if Papyrus had even told him his name.

"yeah. heh. have you introduced yourself yet, papyrus?" Sans asked. 

"NO! OH MY GOSH, I AM SO SORRY! THAT WAS VERY RUDE OF ME! I AM THE GREAT PAPYRUS, AND I AM VERY PLEASED TO HAVE MET YOU!" Papyrus then posed as he always did, his magic fluttering his scarf for him in a flamboyant manner. Sans chuckled to himself a little, he didn't think he'd ever get tired of seeing that.

"Nice to meet you too, Papyrus. Your.. bro..ther?" the woman said, her voice unsure. Sans nodded to affirm her guess. "was nice enough to rescue my cereal from the stairs last night. I almost lost it forever." Sans was quiet for a moment, then his face lit up. Yes! He'd get to use it already!

"gotta be careful, coulda been a cereal killer wandering these halls." Sans quipped. She made a 'pfft' sort of noise, but still smiled. Papyrus was glaring at Sans, and let out a dramatic huff of air.

"THAT WAS TERRIBLE, SANS. BUT ANYWAY, I DID NOT ASK YOU, WHAT WAS YOUR NAME HUMAN?"

"Oh! It's _____." she put her hand out for a handshake.

Papyrus shook her hand, and to everyone's surprise but hers, a fart noise strained out between their hands. Sans's smile genuinely stretched from ear to ear (if he had them) and he almost choked with laughter. Papyrus on the other hand, did  _not_ find it nearly as amusing. He let out a loud "UUUUUUUGHHHH" while Sans damn near collapsed with laughter by the dinner table.

"oh my... god..." he wheezed, "this is great."

"NO, THIS IS AWFUL!! DID HE PUT YOU UP TO THIS _____?" Papyrus inquired, still groaning.

"No!" she cried, her hands shooting up in front of her in apology. Why was she apologizing? That was freaking poetry. "No, I just... I mean, I'll be honest, and please take no offense - I've never met anyone like you guys before, so when Sans did that, I thought maybe it was customary to do so? I'm really sorry!"  _Oh shit_. She thought it was a monster  _custom_. Sans just began laughing even harder at this, wondering what the hell she thought when he did it to her. This poor girl! Papyrus on the other hand ceased his groaning, and crossed his arms.

"THAT WOULD MAKE SENSE. NO OFFENSE TAKEN, AND APOLOGY ACCEPTED! WE SHALL BE GOOD FRIENDS, WORRY NOT!" Papyrus beamed at her, then shot an irritated glance at Sans. Sans was far too amused to care.

"oh man, kid. you just made my day. thanks." Sans had finished his laughter and was just sort of chuckling to himself now. She looked both confused  _and_ irritated. He didn't know if you thought that was great, or a bad thing.

"Well, I'm not sure what you guys like, so I made you some chocolate chip cookies. It's kinda a tradition around here, if you will. If you don't like them, let me know and I can make you something else, if you want." she offered. Who the fuck didn't like chocolate chip cookies? If there was someone out there like that, Sans didn't want to know them.

"nah, i love chocolate chip cookies." Sans responded, and walked over, putting his hand out. She handed him the tupperware, and he took it. Sans was about to say something when he realized she was staring at his hands. Ah. Well, they were strange, weren't they? 

"I'm sorry." she said, looking away. Sans felt like a leper.

"s'fine." Sans responded, shuffling into the kitchen with the cookies. "you don't need to worry so much. we're not gonna bite."

"NO! DEFINITELY NOT!" Papyrus shouted, clearly upset that she may think that either of them bit people. 

"Look, I'm gonna take off - I hope you enjoy the cookies. And thanks for inviting me in, Papyrus!" She said while nudging the taller brother, causing Sans to give a small smile. "My door's always open to you guys, stop by whenever you want or need. We're officially neighbors now, and all."

"THAT'S GREAT!" Papyrus almost slammed into her in response. "WE SHALL TAKE ADVANTAGE OF THIS OPPORTUNITY! THANK YOU _____!"

"thanks for the the cookies. glad you didn't have a _chip_ on your shoulder about the misunderstanding about our.. customs." his smiled broadened.

"No harm, no foul!" she stated, waving it off. Sans' smile went down a little. Man, was his pun game that off? "Have a good night you two."

"GOOD NIGHT HUMAN! SLEEP WELL!" She waved goodbye, and exited their apartment, heading back into hers. Papyrus looked at Sans. "WELL THAT WENT WONDERFULLY! I'M GLAD YOU DECIDED TO SAY HELLO TO OUR NEW NEIGHBOR!"

"what can i say? she looked like she had a lotta  _dough_." Sans joked, and snickered. Papryus put his hands over his ears and let out a miserable cry. "i think i'm gonna go to bed paps, i'm bone-tired."

"YOU DO THAT SANS, I CAN FINISH UP HERE WITHOUT YOUR HORRIBLE JOKES." Papyrus grumbled, heading back into the kitchen. Sans gave a shrug, and went back into his bedroom. He closed the door, and sat at his desk momentarily, thumbing at his journal. Against his better judgement, he flipped it open.

' _don't read it, jackass.'_ were the letters on the page he flipped to. God damnit past self, why did he know himself so well? He sank his head into his hands in frustration. He always thought it'd get easier, but in reality everything was just getting so damned hard. There were too many unknowns, too much that could go wrong, and for some stupid assed reason he had decided to keep himself blind to the past. As far as he knew, he'd  _never_ done that before - so this was upsetting. He slammed his fist on his desk and shut the book, and flopped himself onto his unmade bed.

Fuck it. He'll just wing it like he used to. 

_It'll be fine._

Sans stared at the ceiling, going over everything he knew until he couldn't keep his eyes open any longer, and fell into a deep sleep.

He dreamt of nothing. But he dreamt. And all there was, was a yawning abyss that he stared into until he woke.


	2. Chapter 2

It hadn't taken particularly long for Sans to seek employment. He started as he always did - a handful of jobs to get him by until someone would take him on full-time somewhere. If life continued on the way it had been, Papyrus likely wouldn't be able to secure work for a long while, or even before they wound up moving again. It wasn't Papyrus's fault, really, he was just overly enthusiastic and - well - a skeleton. Humans were weird when their versions of the reanimated dead came trouncing into their workplace looking for a job.

But still, Sans never quite understood as to why there had never been a program, or a law passed about monster discrimination. It definitely still happened, but then again, it had only been a handful of years. Change never happened quickly, and while the irritation of his brother's unemployment was in the back of his mind, he  _did_  notice that he was able to get hired much faster here than anywhere else. So far he'd landed an interview as a night shift forklift operator (getting his license was the smartest thing he could have done a while back) and one at a grocery store called Fast n' Fresh. Neither were full-time at the moment, and unfortunately the construction job was only temporary, but hey! It would pay the rent.

To boot, Sans was thoroughly impressed by his neighbors. The ones below him actually waved to him the other day as he left for work, and the one living across from him made them freaking cookies. No one had ever done that before! He was beginning to feel optimistic about the city they were in, but carefully guarded against it. Whenever things looked up, something was always lurking there to shoot it down – and the fact that he was flying blind didn’t help one bit. If there was anything about this experience that was pissing him off, it was _that_.

But he wouldn’t tell himself to be in the dark without good reason. So, blind he stayed.

That morning he had gone to his Fast n’ Fresh interview, not really knowing what to expect. The construction interview would be simple for him; usually his friends never knew he even did construction of any kind, they just liked to assume he was lazy. Sans, doing physical labour? Unheard of! And he kept those jobs for the wee hours of the night so it would stay that way. Upsetting the natural balance of things was never a particularly good idea.

He entered the grocery store, and immediately felt eyes on him. He wasn’t unfamiliar with that, but it still made him feel a twinge of anger regardless. He walked to the first cashier he saw, wanting to get this over with quickly; he wasn’t in the mood to deal with discrimination for whatever reason today.

“hey,” he said to the younger man who was staring at him with wide eyes, “i’m here for an interview. mind pointing me in the right direction?”

  
“Y-yeah, sure!” the man practically squeaked – was he a teenager? Sans had trouble sometimes telling human ages. “I’ll call a manager up right now!” He watched as the young man picked up a phone and spoke into it, echoing across the supermarket. “M-manager to register one please!”

“thanks.” Sans said simply, and gave him his most reassuring smile. _You need to work here, don’t scare the co-workers_ , he thought to himself. The man seemed to relax slightly, but was still exceedingly nervous. He fidgeted with a pen in his hands until what appeared to be one of the store managers showed up. It was a taller gentleman, probably in his mid forties with thinning hair. His nametag read ‘Ross’.

“Can I help you?” he asked, sniffing a little. Sans nodded, and extended his hand for a handshake.

“yeah, name’s sans. i have an interview today at noon?” Sans offered, and watched as Ross instinctively reached out for the handshake, then froze as their hands came into contact with one another. Still, he shook, and it was an extremely firm handshake. Sans grinned a little at that.

“Ah! Yes, I spoke with you on the phone. Come right on in this way, the office is towards the back.” he said, and began leading Sans to it. Sans looked around casually – it looked like any other supermarket. As Ross opened the door, he turned to Sans.

“Wasn’t expecting you to be a monster,” he started, and Sans felt his eye involuntarily twitch. “Not that it’s a problem, just don’t see a lot of them, you know?” Sans looked up at the man, and suddenly he felt it. The overlap.

 _Don’t tell Lady Gaga._ Nope.

 _You know what? I don’t need this job._ Not that one.

 _Wait, there’s a monster here?_ Ah, that one.

“wait, there’s a monster here?” Sans said, mock looking around. Ross’s face broke out into a smile and he let out a little laugh.

“Yeah, she works in the meat department. Don’t let her see you, her name’s Barbara.” He said, half pointing in the direction. As he went to his desk, he brushed up against the side and bumped it, and then he saw it.

 _The coffee. It fell._ Everything was fine, but there was an awkward mess.

 _Catch it!_ He was extremely impressed.

Sans reached his hand out immediately, hoping it was the right choice, catching it as it was on it’s way down. Ross turned, seeing him seemingly snatch it with aerial precision, and his eyebrows raised.

“Damn, you have quick reflexes! Thank you, I appreciate that.” he said, carefully taking the coffee out of Sans’s hand and placing it back on his desk, albeit in a safer place. He sat down in his chair across from Sans, and let out a tired sigh. “Anyway, your phone interview was great, your resume is impressive – as far as I’m concerned, I’d love to hire you.”

Sans thought he heard a ‘but’ in there. “sounds great to me.” he said casually.

“Just have to wait for you to pass the background check. Did you bring your MID with you?” Ross asked. Sans nodded, pulling it out. He hadn’t before. He handed it to Ross, and he looked at it for a moment.

“Great, I’ll be right back, just need to make a copy.” He said, and went into another room to scan Sans’s ID. Sans fidgeted for a moment, as the overlap was surprisingly strong right now. He rubbed at his eyesocket, hoping it would pass. Ross returned after a few minutes, handing him back his ID. “Thanks.”

“of course. how long will the background check take?” he asked. Ross was flipping through some papers.

“Roughly 2 weeks, tops. You don’t have to pass a drug test, obviously, so it’s just verifying your previous employment, and checking your ID.” He said. “A shame, I really need people ASAP. But as far as I’m concerned, you’re hired.”

 _We haven’t even talked about salary._ He frowned.

 _Is it part-time or full-time?_ Answers.

“is it part-time or full-time?” Sans asked. “i applied for both, so just wasn’t sure.”

“We have both, actually. We need a part-time cashier, and a full-time stocker. Do you have a preference?”

“full time would be great. plus i’d probably do better in the back, won’t lie.” Sans said. Ross raised a brow to him in question. “y’know. skeleton and all.”

 _He never seemed comfortable with that._ But it was too late.

“Yeah, well… “ Ross said, waving his hand, but not finishing his thought. “We’ll give you a call to let you know if you got the job for certain.”

“sounds good.” Sans said, slowly standing up. Ross stood as well, and this time he extended his hand first. _That was new._

“Nice to meet you Sans. Have a good day today.”

“thanks, you too.”  Sans said, shaking the hand with enthusiasm. His smile wasn’t forced this time, it was genuine. He gave a small wave and walked out, feeling mildly chipper.

 _Well, you’ve definitely done this before._ He thought to himself, _So we’re at least in the right direction. If you can call it that._ He had a slight pep to his step, and began to walk back to his apartment when he saw a sign for a local spirits shop. He thought about his neighbor, and the fact that _that_ went so well also. Time to pay it back, he figured.

He entered the shop, the sound of an old bell ringing above him. The store was decently sized, with wooden floors and racks upon racks of various spirits. It looked mostly like wine, he thought, which sucked as he didn’t know a damned thing about wine. Maybe the cashier would know –

“oh. well then.” He said, as he looked at his neighbor behind the counter, oblivious to the fact he even entered. He heard a strange meowing noise with electronic chiptune music in the background.

“Oh! Hey!” she said, her head shooting up from her phone to look at him. She stared at him for a moment, and he waited in silence – did she actually work here? “Welcome to  Bacchus’s Cellar! You looking for anything in particular today?” Sans couldn’t help but chuckle to himself, and casually placed his hands inside his jacket pocket – he remembered them upsetting her yesterday when he took the Tupperware.

“yeah, i’m looking for a good wine for someone. mind helping me?” he said, as he walked over to the gigantic wall of bottles. This was perfect, she would have zero clue. “don’t know much about the stuff, honestly. but i’m trying to impress someone _here_.”

The emphasis flew right over her head, and she bounced to her feet. “Ah! Then you definitely don’t want _that_ selection.” She said, and motioned for him to follow her over to another part of the store. His smile began to broaden, because this felt like the best prank he could possibly be pulling on her right now. "I'm going to ask you right off the bat, do you have a price limit you're working with here? Or are you trying to REALLY impress someone?"

“no limit.” He responded, as casually as possible. "besides, there's no point in _wine-ing_ about the price." She rolled her eyes at this, but it didn’t deter him.

"Yeah, if you did, I'd just tell you to put a _cork_  in it." she retorted. Sans couldn’t stop himself from grinning, he appreciated the response, even though it was sarcastic. "Anyway, do you know what type of wine they like? Reds? Whites?" Sans merely shrugged.

"no clue. they've never really told me, and as i said, i don't know much about the stuff. what would you recommend?"

"Oh jeez," she replied, rubbing the back of her neck in thought, "That's kinda an open-ended question there. I could recommend probably a zillion things here, if I had something to go off of but... I mean, they do drink the stuff, right?"

"it's pretty apparent they do," he said, trying his damnedest not to laugh "so anything'll work. it's just gotta be the good stuff."

"The good stuff." She repeated.

"the good stuff." he echoed. How unamused would she have been had he said ‘I want it cheap, and I don’t care about the taste’ and then presented it to her as a gift? It’d be funny… to him. But he wanted his neighbor to like him. He waited for the moment of overlap.

It didn’t come.

"Welp," she said, her tone becoming sly, "this here is a really nice Riesling from 2003, made in Alsace, France. It has extremely nice floral, apricot and honey notes to it. But what I like best about it, is it has a really nice earthy hint, sort of smokey - and then it finishes with a delicious tangy, spice-laden tangerine flavour. It's my absolute favourite, but it's about $250 a bottle.” Internally, Sans balked at the price. Who the hell would spend that much money on a damned bottle of booze? Then again, he was blowing through $150 whiskeys like it was candy in a reception office, so he couldn’t really judge.

"sounds great, i'll take it." he replied, carefully taking the bottle from her as to not draw attention to his hands. She looked genuinely surprised that he so quickly gave in.

"Well, I mean, there's more choices in here of course. You don't have to take the first wine I recommend. Plus there's a lot cheaper options..." she started saying, backing down from her original sales pitch. Now he _knew_ he had a good wine.

"nah, this'll be perfect. you really got a good sales pitch there, champ." he said behind an overly smug grin, trying his damnedest not to laugh. "were you _bottling_  that one up for a while?"

 

"Yeah, I  _decant_  believe you fell for it so easily." She responded, her eyes rolling once again. Suddenly, he felt the overlap for a moment.

 

 _Yeah, I’m not that grape at resisting._ She snorted, it sounded irritated.

 

 _I felt like you’d wine if I didn’t._ Shit! He’d already used that!

 

"well, you were  _bordeauxing_  on esctatic about this so..." he said slowly, waving the bottle in front of him. He threw in a wink for good measure.

 

And she laughed.

"Oh jeez, I've actually never heard that before, that was a good one. Props to you, mister." She headed behind her counter and halted for a moment, looking blankly at the register. Her head raised to him to look at him again."You all good to check out?"

"yeah, sure thing." he began to pull his wallet out from his jacket, and thought for a moment to himself. Had he thanked her yet? "thanks for the cookies, by the way. papyrus and i loved 'em."

"Oh yeah! Of course. Hey, new neighbors and all. It's the polite thing to do. Besides, I had to repay the saviour of my cereal." He grinned as she rang him up, glad that he had taken the chance to do that the other day. They were both silent for a moment, when he finally plucked up the courage to ask her.

"heh, yeah. anytime. hey, what time are you off?" he asked abruptly. She looked surprised. Shit, he wasn’t coming onto her, he hoped to god she didn’t think that.

"Er, why?" she asked, her voice unsure. He inwardly groaned, he probably could have phrased that a _lot_ better.

"papyrus and i wanted to invite you over to thank you for your cookies, if you didn't mind. he's making spaghetti for dinner tonight." he paused suddenly, his grin almost faltering, "it's fine if you don't want to --"

"five." She said, cutting him off. She grabbed the cash out of his hand absentmindedly, before he even handed it to her. He could tell she felt awkward. "But I gotta carry some stuff, so probably won't be home until 5:30. But spaghetti sounds awesome." For some reason, he felt a swell in his chest at her acceptance.  

"great. we'll see you around six then?" he said, finding a weird sort of irony in her bagging her own gift.

"Yeah! Of course!" she said happily, and he gave a sincere smile to her before he headed out. He felt the overlap.

 _Nothing was said._ Should he say something this time?

"thanks for your help. i  _barrelly_  knew what i was doing. have a good one.'" Then he headed out before she could say anything else, or even roll her eyes in his general direction. As the door shut behind him, he felt a strange surge of unease. It wasn’t like him to break patterns like this, not this often.

_If only I’d let myself read that damned journal!_ He grumbled to himself. He looked up towards the sky, seeing stormclouds beginning to form. Shit, he didn’t even know the weather. This was absolute bullshit.

 

But, on the flipside, he felt good about his interactions today. While he might be bumbling, he seemed to be getting along well with the neighbor so far – but they’d still yet to have dinner. He wasn’t sure how that was going to go, but it was obvious to him that they’d done it before. He could take solace in at least that.

 

He couldn’t stop himself from humming a tune as he walked home.

* * *

 

 

Sans was pacing in his room, wondering what he had done. Had he really invited her over? Papyrus was thrilled, of course, but he didn’t know what he was getting into. He didn’t _know_ anything about her. And while his earlier joke of buying stupidly expensive wine for her seemed hilarious before, now he was extremely nervous about it. Would she take it the wrong way? Would she think he was coming onto her? Trying to show her up? Shit, this wasn’t a very well thought out plan, was it?

He was trying to impress her, that was for sure. He was happy she was nice to them. He hadn’t experienced that much up top, and didn’t want to blow this.

Sans sucked in a large breath of air through his nose, and put on his game face. His muscles naturally shifted his face into an easy smile, and he steeled himself as he walked the entire five feet to her doorstep. He’d make this casual, so it wouldn’t feel weird. His fingers reached out tentatively for a moment, pausing before he hit the doorbell. Yeah, this felt right. No overlap, no déjà vu to guide him, but this felt like the right thing to do.

"One second!" he heard muffled from inside. His neighbor came to the door after a minute, swinging it open. Sans eased himself into a calmer state of mind.

"hey neighbor. you work up an appetite?"

"Sure did!" she said in excitement, rubbing her stomach. "I love me some food."

"awesome, just wanted to say, come on in whenever you're ready, no need to knock." Was that too forward?

"Ah! Well, I'm ready now so..." she said, shrugging a shoulder. Sans waited patiently for her to lock her door, and then opened his own, motioning for her to go ahead and enter. As she came in, she began appraising the place. Sans suddenly hoped she liked it.

"Looks good!  I like it!"

"THANK YOU, _____!" exclaimed Papyrus, who had been standing by the door. "I DECIDED IT NEEDED A PERSONAL TOUCH, SO I TOUCHED IT PERSONALLY!"

"Yeah, looks like it. Very homey! I especially like the flower arrangement on the table." She said, motioning to the flowers. Sans didn’t care much for flowers, but that was for personal reasons.

"OH! THAT WAS SENT TO US BY OUR FRIENDS! UNDYNE WISHED TO SEND PRACTICAL WEAPONRY, BUT YOUR HUMAN POSTAL SERVICE FROWNS UPON SUCH A THING." Papyrus said, sighing, "BUT ALPHYS SENT THESE LOVELY FLOWERS IN THEIR STEAD!"

"Ah, that sucks. Nothing like getting a claymore in the mail. Carnations are a pretty good substitute though." Sans couldn’t help but chuckle, she had a good sense of humour.

"YES, IT IS BETTER TO WIN OVER YOUR ENEMIES WITH FRIENDSHIP!"

"Yeah, hug 'em to death." She said jokingly. Sans felt his face contort for a moment against his will, remembering that… _that little shit._ "Anyway, is that the spaghetti that smells so good?"

"YES! I AM THROUGHLY GLAD THAT YOU RECOGNIZE THE DELICIOUS SMELL THAT IS MY VERY OWN HOMEMADE SPAGHETTI!" Papyrus exclaimed, leaping into the kitchen with gusto. "WHEN SANS TOLD ME YOU WERE COMING OVER, I KNEW I HAD TO MAKE IT EXTRA DELICIOUS! YOUR COOKIES WERE VERY TASTY, ALTHOUGH NOT AS NOODLY AS I WOULD HAVE LIKED."

Papyrus began putting the dinnerware on the table, and she looked towards him with surprise.

"GO AHEAD! SIT! WE SHALL BE EATING SHORTLY! SANS, WHY DON'T YOU OFFER HER SOME OF THAT RIDICULOUS GRAPE JUICE YOU GOT EARLIER TODAY?" She laughed a little, and sat down in the chair nearest to her.

"That's for someone special, Papyrus. Methinks I'll have some water, or something along those lines." Sans sat in the seat adjacent to her, extremely delighted this was happening, and procured the bottle of wine he had bought.

"yeah, this stuff, right?" he said, waving it like he did back in the shop. She nodded, not quite comprehending what was going on.

"Uhhhh." Began pouring out of her mouth, as Sans began uncorking the wine. "What."

"like i said," he said, pouring her a glass and handing it to her – then one for himself, he definitely wanted to try it. "i needed to impress someone there." He leaned back in his chair, grinning to himself as he watched her process what was going on. She was staring at her wine glass, then at him, then to the bottle he casually set on the table. Slowly, the gears began to turn.

"Dude. Sans. This is too much. Are you serious?"

"don't i look serious?" he responded, still looking extremely smug. He swished his wine around, then gulped some down. "nice. i taste that tangerine."

Papyrus was carefully placing the spaghetti in front of Sans and their guest, and placed one down in his spot as well.

"TIME TO EAT! HELP YOURSELF, ______!" he stated, handing her a pasta fork. She took it, looked up at the smiling skeletons, and timidly took a bite. Papyrus watched with delight as her face went from consternation to happiness.

"Delicious!" she said, nudging Papyrus with your elbow. Papyrus slapped his hands to his face, positively thrilled to hear that.

"OH HUMAN, THAT IS SO KIND OF YOU TO SAY! PLEASE HAVE AS MUCH AS YOU LIKE! I WILL MAKE YOU SPAGHETTI WHENEVER YOU WANT, FOR FEW PEOPLE UNDERSTAND IT'S COMPLEXITIES! BUT YOU, YOU GET IT! THIS IS FANTASTIC!" He had grabbed her hands suddenly, causing her to drop her fork. Sans was watching the exchange with extreme amusement.

"Yeah! I'll.. I'll uh, hit you up whenever I get that good ol' spaghetti craving!" she said, her voice cracking a bit with what sounded like nervousness. Sans was enjoying watching her and his brother get along, and reached for the ketchup. He poured some over his spaghetti and stirred it in, then took a bite. Good, as always. His brother’s cooking thank god got quite a bit better since coming above ground. He’d always eat whatever he made, sure, but now he actually didn’t mind eating it.

"So uh, what brought you guys to town?"  she asked, looking at the both of the brothers.

"needed a change of pace." Sans replied, looking towards her wine glass. She hadn’t even taken a sip yet – did she not actually like it? She noticed him looking to and from the wine glass, and took a sip out of politeness. Her face melted into what looked like pure pleasure, and she took a second one before putting it down.

"Yeah? You guys already get jobs or anything?"

"NO." Papyrus replied, noodles dangling from his mouth. "HOWEVER IT NEVER TAKES MY BROTHER LONG TO GET ONE, DESPITE HOW LAZY HE IS. I HOWEVER, NEED TO GO ON A JOB HUNT." Sans shrugged a shoulder, taking another bite of his noodles. He hadn’t told Papyrus about the interviews yet, mostly because his brother tended to stress if he didn’t get the job.

"i already scoped a few out. we have a savings." He said casually.

"Dude, Sans, you really shouldn't have..." she said quietly,  gesturing to the wine. He waved her off.

"i told you, i wanted to impress someone. hopefully it's working." he chuckled. "i mean, it's no chocolate chip cookie but it still took some _dough_." Papyrus started groaning.

"Well, colour me impressed." She said, finishing off her dinner, then held up her glass. "How about a toast?"

Sans raised a browbone. She was being overly friendly, he thought. Then again, he did just buy her a $250 bottle of wine. Judgment really wasn’t fair at this table at the moment.

"A TOAST? THAT SOUNDS FANTASTIC! TO WHAT?" Papyrus asked.

"Being great neighbors!" she said happily, then paused. "Nah. To being great friends!"

"I LOVE FRIENDSHIP!" exclaimed Papyrus, clinking his glass against hers.

"to being friends." Sans said quietly, hoping to god that this was going to be a lasting friendship. He really didn’t need another psychotic neighbor. She did, however, bridge the gap between the lot of them by making the first step by making cookies, so she couldn’t be all that bad… right?

"Y'know, I was kinda pissy I already got neighbors so fast, but you guys are seriously really cool. Thanks so much for dinner and this.. amazing wine. Seriously. Thanks." Papyrus beamed at this, and Sans couldn’t stop himself from smiling.

"YOU'RE THE BEST NEIGHBOR WE'VE EVER HAD, AND YOU'LL BE ONE OF OUR BESTEST FRIENDS!" Papyrus said, suddenly hugging her. Sans watched, noticing her struggling a little.

"Hokay Papyrus, new friend, buddy, I can't breathe."

"OH MY GOODNESS, I'M SO SORRY!" he said, releasing her immediately. Sans laughed.

"drink and eat up, enjoy."  Sans, Papyrus and the new neighbor chatted happily amongst themselves. Sans couldn’t remember when he had such a pleasant conversation with a human, and for once genuinely engaged himself. He felt his guard slipping a little as they talked about the mundane – life, jobs, people. Papyrus looked extremely pleased as well, noticing that his brother was talking more. Sans felt the moment of overlap as he listened to the chatter, and settled into his chair comfortably. Perhaps this was a good thing.

"Alright boys," she said, her eyes darting upwards. "I'd love to stay, but I actually do have work in the morning - and I'm guessing that clock is semi-accurate." She gestured to the clock above the table. It was almost midnight.

"ah shit. yeah, sorry, didn't mean to keep you so long." Sans said, also standing.

"Pfft, whatever. This was great. I'm down for spaghetti nights whenever." Papyrus shot up at this, positively gleaming with giddiness.

"I WILL COOK YOU SPAGHETTI ANY TIME YOU WANT, JUST SAY THE WORD." he practically shouted at her. "THIS IS WHAT FRIENDS DO!"

"Hah, alright Papyrus! I'll take you up on that." she said with a gentle smile. "Alright, c'mere. I don't trust handshakes anymore, so are hugs alright?" Papyrus didn’t even wait, he swept her up in his arms and crushed her to him.

"HUGS ARE ALWAYS ALRIGHT." he said with a smile, releasing her. She looked at Sans, her arms opening as well to him.

"C'mon, you too."

"nah, i'm good." he said, shifting from one foot to another. She rolled her eyes and crossed over to him, giving him a big hug. His body tensed at her touch, and he stood there awkwardly as she hugged him. He liked her enough, sure, but he still didn’t one hundred percent trust her.

"Whatever, you don't get a say, Mr. I Buy Expensive Wine n' Shit." she laughed, letting him go. He looked up at her for a second, then suddenly he laughed as well. What was she getting out of this? Hate from her fellow humans? He needed to relax.

"yeah, i guess you got me there. there's no  _riesling_  for me to not get a hug." She groaned, which just made him smile more.

"Jesus, you really love those puns, don't you. Alright, whatever guys, I'm out. Have a good night."

"wait." Sans said, as she was heading to the door. He went into the kitchen, then came back out. "take this with you." He handed you the wine. He really didn’t need to keep alcohol in the house.

"Nuh uh. Keep that here." Sans inwardly frowned.

"i don't really drink the stuff a lot." he responded.

"Then we'll save it for spaghetti nights!" she said, giving a hearty wink. Was she serious? She actually planned on coming back? He cradled the bottle in his hands, hisfingers rapped against the glass, making a hollow noise, then he smirked.

"i'm holding ya to that."

"Deal."

"shake on it?" he said, his tone extremely sly.

"Fuck you." she said, and let out a hideous laugh. Sans couldn’t stop himself from cracking up.

"good night."

"Night."

"GOOD NIGHT _____!"

She exited the apartment, and Sans closed the door behind her. He stood there for a moment, looking at the bottle of wine in his hand. _That went better than expected._ Papyrus looked to Sans, his face filled with joy.

“HOW WONDERFUL SHE WAS! WE’VE NEVER BEEN SO FORTUNATE AS TO HAVE SUCH A PERSON LIVING ACROSS FROM US!” he said, his voice filled with excitement.

“heh, yeah.” Sans said, still trying to wrap his head around it. “she seems nice enough.”

“SHE MADE US COOKIES, SANS! HOW COULD SHE NOT BE NICE?” Papyrus asked, confused.

“listen, paps. just be careful, alright? not to be a debbie downer, but you know how this shit goes down sometimes.” He said, regretting his words almost immediately. Papyrus’s shoulders sagged.

“YES, I SUPPOSE SO. BUT I WOULD LIKE TO HOPE THAT SHE COULD BE DIFFERENT.” He said, his tone lowered. Sans sighed, and put a hand on Papyrus’s back in a comforting manner.

“she might. just… be careful, alright?”

“IS THIS ONE OF YOUR ‘GUT FEELINGS’ YOU HAVE?” Papyrus asked, looking to Sans. Sans paused for a moment. He actually didn’t get that vibe, which was good. But something was still off, and he didn’t like it.

“nah, just being overly cautious. you know me.” he said, and started to head into his bedroom.

“SANS, AREN’T YOU GOING TO HELP WITH THE DISHES?” Papyrus huffed from the dining room.

“i’m tired, i’ll do it tomorrow.” He said, shutting the door behind him. Papyrus grumbled angrily outside his door, and Sans heard the clattering of dishes being picked up and brought into the kitchen. He really should help Papyrus, but he was feeling extremely drained all of a sudden.

Why was he being so weird about this? His eyes glanced at his journal, and he sighed. That’s probably why. He knew he was reliving this, but this time he was actively changing shit around. He needed to knock it off, because that’s when things flew off the rails. They had met before, sure, and while he figured she wasn’t dangerous or otherwise, he still felt an odd ache in his chest when he looked at her sometimes. If that wasn’t a warning enough, he didn’t know what was.

Flopping back onto his bed, he looked up at his ceiling. _Stop being a pessimist, jackass. Today went well. Accept it._

But he couldn’t. He simply couldn’t.

Sans slowly drifted off to sleep, once again dreaming of nothing.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm not 100% sure about his "overlap" format, so please give me feedback and let me know what you think. But to summarize, Sans is seeing / hearing all the timelines converging at a single point, and is making a choice based on the best outcome he sees in literally that second.
> 
> poor sans :c
> 
> Don't worry, as I'm not going to be reliving every single conversation they have - it's going to be the more important bits methinks! <3


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> That human is growing on him, but only a little.

The city had been surprisingly good to them, which constantly surprised Sans. While he felt like the interview went well, he still wasn’t 100% sure about getting the job. He managed to already start the construction job, which kept him busy from 9pm or so until roughly 5am. While that was fine, and again, temporary, after getting the Fast n’ Fresh job he began to feel the effects of working as long as he did.

It didn’t help either, that the schedules were constantly fluctuating. Sure, Fast n’ Fresh hired him on fulltime, however his hours bounced all over the place. 40 hour work weeks, on random assed days, at random assed times. He never understood the complete lack of solidarity in scheduling with humans, he thought it was pretty damned stupid to be honest. While he could run on a pretty decent lack of sleep, his co-workers seemingly could _not_. And when he was working until 5am, getting home, switching into a uniform and heading straight to work at 7, he began to pray for his construction job to be over soon.

But he liked it more, honestly. He’d slap on a safety helmet, put on his Dickies, and just _work_. There was little interaction outside of getting the job done on the graveyard shift, and the guys he worked with appreciated that he did his fair share of what needed to be done. Sometimes, when no one was watching, he’d use his magic to help him lift the heavier stuff – you know, things that would be a bit more difficult on average – but soon he had to stop doing that. Burning himself out on both ends was not the end goal, and that’s exactly what was happening.

A month or so after starting at Fast n’ Fresh, he began to notice how frequently things were overlapping. A joke told to a customer to ease tension, a shipment that was more important than others, a shift he previously had missed. He was extremely cautious not to deviate from the norm.

Except when it came to her. She was his ‘anomaly’ if you will. He’d sense overlaps, things he’d said to her before that would make her laugh, or frown when they had their dinners together – but he would sometimes completely ignore them. He wanted something new with her, something fresh. And she was constantly surprising him with her reactions, which would sometimes make him laugh; other times, it made him wish that he had hair so he could tear it out. The most frustrating aspect of it all, is that he couldn’t pinpoint what it was about her that made him want to possibly branch out from his normal routine behaviour. She was a fairly average human, nothing screamed to him about her having any special abilities like the kid… so what was it about her that mentally drew her to him?

 _She’s friendly, you idiot. She’s the first kind person you’ve encountered that you’ve actually become friends with._ Well, sure. It’s not like every human had been a raging asshole until her, but he’d never bothered to try and become _friends_ with any of them. Papyrus would make connections, be the usual social butterfly, and Sans would merely observe as he always did. Why get involved? It was all going to probably reset anyway.

Good god, he was so sick of it all. He thought he had left that behind in the Underground, but it followed him right back up. _Hopes and dreams my ass._

It was a Wednesday afternoon, nothing particularly out of the ordinary. He had headed to work, grumbling at the rain slightly. His manager, Ross, kept him in the stockroom per his own personal request – but would have him still work the floor during the day. He was relegated to cleaning or the deli when he wasn’t busy with shipments. This surprised him, as he thought Ross would want to keep him off the main floor as much as possible – but that wasn’t the case. He thought Sans was a good worker, and some of the more progressive people in the city began to frequent the store because of hiring equality.

Not that there weren’t still some assholes once in a blue moon. He had been cleaning up a minor spill near the produce section, when _she_ walked in. Mrs. Herman, the most vile old woman this side of the world. He carefully scooted around the cucumbers as she approached, and she spat where he was mopping.

“If this wasn’t walking distance, I’d never come here.” she said, her voice filled with hate. He ignored her as he usually did. As she rounded the corner, her eyes narrowing at Sans, he suddenly felt the overlap once again.

 _She slips and falls. She breaks some items in her basket._ He’s blamed for her misfortune.

 _She passes without incident, mutters obscenities._ The day goes on as usual.

Sans’s body tensed. There’s nothing more he’d like than to see her go flying feet up in the air and crack a damned hipbone, or something along those lines. But what if she fell again this time? He quickly walked behind her, and suddenly, one of her feet skidded on the wet floor around the ‘caution’ sign he carefully put up.

 _Fuck!_ his brain screamed, and without thinking about it, reached out and caught her. He almost lost his own footing as she came crashing into him, and she let out a terrible screech.

“UnHAND me you piece of shit!” she shouted, hitting him with her entire basket. Sans released her as she tried to swing it at him again, and his hand reflexively shot out, gripping her wrist.

“ **s t o p”** he growled, the lights in his eyes going out. Her eyes widened in fear, her arm going slack in his grasp.

“Don’t kill me!” she cried, her eyes filling with tears suddenly. Sans shook his head, and let her go as fast as possible. But a small crowd had already begun to form, looking to see what the shouting was about.

“hey, you okay?” he asked, and tried to appear as non-threatening as possible. “no one’s gonna hurt you.” _Are you fucking kidding me?_

“Oh god, he wants to kill me!” she shouted, and began to back up. Sans stood there awkwardly, rubbing the back of his neck.  Some of the people watching started to mutter in anger – not at Sans, but at her behaviour. Suddenly, Ross came storming up behind Sans, spinning him around.

“What’s going on here?” he demanded, looking at Mrs. Herman, then back to Sans. Sans’s eyes widened, his mind racing. There was no overlap. He’d never had this happen before. _Shit._

“she fell, i tried to stop her from falling. she… misunderstood.” Sans said simply. Mrs. Herman was crying into what looked like a loaf of bread.

“Go take your break. Now.” Ross said, his teeth clenched. Sans lowered his hat and hurried through the crowd to the back as fast as possible. God damnit, why did he do that? He made everything even _worse_. He punched out on the clock, and sat in the break room, his head sunk into his hands.

He was so very, very tired.

After about twenty minutes, Ross came into the back, pulling a chair up next to Sans. “Hey.” He said, Sans not bothering to look up. He was waiting to be yelled at. “You okay?” His hand suddenly was on Sans’s shoulder in a comforting manner. Sans looked up, surprised.

“yeah, i’m fine. i’m sorry ross, i really tried to stop her from falling.” Sans said, his voice thick. Ross nodded knowingly.

“And you did. Listen, that old bitch is a thorn in everyone’s side. But we reviewed the security tapes – it’s evident you were trying to assist her.” He said, and paused for a moment. “Do you want to press assault charges?”

“what?” Sans asked, his expression confused.

“Sans, she hit you in the damned head with a shopping basket. It was filled with items. Hell, what do I even do with you? Do you need to go to ER?” Ross asked, his hand moving to his head to inspect to see if there was any damage. There wasn’t anything visible, but Sans realized how badly his head actually hurt.

“nah, nah. i’m fine.” he said, trying to wave it off. Ross frowned.

“You sure? Look, normally I’d send one of my workers to the hospital for an x-ray. I mean…” he stopped for a second, his hands raising as if to explain, then they dropped. Sans could tell he was struggling to not be ignorant, and Sans felt a great appreciation for it.

“don’t worry, seriously. just got a hell of a headache.”

“Alright… but at least clock out for the day, would you? We’ll pay you out for the remainder of your shift. I just don’t want you to be stoic, or secretly dying on me here.” Ross looked at Sans with concern.

“fine, fine. just make sure that crone stays away from me on my way out, would you?”

“She’s been escorted out already. I’m going to talk to the DM, see if we can get her barred from the store. I’m not going to tolerate that sort of behaviour.” Ross was quiet for a tic, then spoke again. “Why didn’t you tell me she was treating you like that this whole time?”

 _I didn’t think you would care._ “not sure, just didn’t come up. m’sorry, i’ll mention it if it happens again.”

“Please do. Go ahead and clock out. Take care of yourself, alright Sans?” Ross said, giving him a friendly pat on the back. “I’ll email you the incident report so you can fill it out at home.” Sans nodded, standing up slowly – shit, his head really did hurt. He clocked out, ignoring the ‘are you sure?’ warning it gave, and looked at the door exiting back into the store.

Maybe he could just shortcut out. He didn’t want to see anyone, he really didn’t. He glanced around, looking at the hall and spotted a security camera. _God damnit._

He sighed, and pushed the door open, walking back out into the store. One of the cashiers, Alex, waved to him as he passed by, making sounds of sympathy. Sans nodded in acknowledgement, and began his trek home.

Why didn’t he tell anyone before this? He knew that he was blamed for her fall in a previous timeline. Did he get fired? He wasn’t sure about that one. Maybe thinking about it right now wasn’t the best idea, because the pain in his head was intensifying. He pulled his hat down as low as it could go, and tried to avoid people on the way back.

 _Of course. Now it rains._ He thought to himself as the sky seemingly opened up above him. He quickened his pace, hurrying inside the lobby of his apartment, staring outward to the street. What a day. He hoped he had asprin in the house, since he didn’t really want to tell Papyrus what had happened.

The trudge up the stairs felt heavier than normal, and he placed his head against the door for a moment as he stuck his key into the lock. Why was he doing this? Why was he trying? All this could get reset tomorrow, it was obvious. Jesus, this was so… _futile_.

He took a deep breath, his face settling into his usual smile, and he opened the door.

“hey paps, i’m home.” He said, closing the door behind him. The house was eerily quiet – usually Papyrus was greeting him already, or clambering in the kitchen with some new pasta idea. “paps?” he said, looking around. No answer. He checked Papyrus’s bedroom, and he wasn’t in there either. _Shit._ Did he go out? He looked at the nightstand and saw his cellphone was still on it. Great, and he couldn’t call him either.

_What if…_

Sans stopped in his tracks, his breath hiccupping on inhale. It wasn’t the same. It was fine. Maybe he was next door?

He quickly went over to his neighbor’s house, and rang the doorbell. He could hear the TV playing inside, so at least she was home. He fidgeted as he stood waiting, his anxiety ramping as he waited for her to answer. Finally, after what felt like forever, she swung the door open and smiled at him. Sans tried to look casual, but it definitely wasn’t coming across.

"hey. is papyrus here?" _Please._

"Yeah, he's been here all afternoon. You wanna come in?" she said, motioning to her home. Sans almost let out a huge sigh of relief, but instead he tried to remain composed. He glanced at her attire – had she been sleeping? She was just in pyjamas, but they hung from her nicely. _Wait, what?_  "We're just watching a movie."

"yeah, sure." he replied, grateful that Papyrus was there. A movie sounded good, it’d give him time to collect his thoughts and calm down. He slowly entered, and noticed her looking at him oddly.

"Oh dang! You work at the Fast n' Fresh?" she asked, closing the door behind him.

"heh, yeah. i work in the back though, they don't mind me there." he responded. He didn’t want to get into the day’s events.

"Why doesn't Papyrus work with you?" she asked suddenly. Sans frowned, another weight coming down on him.

"they don't wanna hire two of us. one's enough, i guess. we're used to it." he just shrugged, trying to downplay it.

"Well, between us girls, Papyrus is stupidly distraught about not having a job right now. I offered to help out..." she said quietly, trailing off. Sans already knew how stressed he was – but he wasn’t sure how long they’d even be there. He was making enough money to support them, why did Papyrus always have to do this?

"you don't have to, y'know." he said, feeling irritated. Good god, were the two of them just a pity case?

"I don't HAVE to, but I WANT to. Huge difference there. You guys are cool, and people are assholes. It's the least I can do." She smiled at him. _Stop it, jackass. She’s trying._ She really was, and he eased into an actual smile.

"thanks." was all he said.

"Anytime. Uh, you can go hang with your brother on the couch, I'll be right back, yeah?" she suggested. Sans nodded, and went to the couch. Papyrus acknowledged Sans’s arrival, but was too wrapped up in the movie to say anything. Instead, he just gave Sans a huge hug. How did he always know? Sans hugged back, and then slouched into the couch. He had no idea what was going on in the film, but it was irrelevant. A few minutes later, his neighbor emerged wearing jeans and a t-shirt. She sat back down next to Sans, but her posture was a little stiffer than normal.

"wardrobe change, eh?" he noticed, a browbone raising.

"It was time to get dressed. Papyrus surprised me earlier, is all." She replied.

"mmm." was all Sans said. Papyrus turned them both.

"SHHHHH!"

"Sorry Papyrus." They both said in unison. And then they looked at each other. He chuckled. She giggled.

"Jinx, you owe me a coke." She whispered to Sans, and he smiled inwardly, giving her a wink.

 The three watched the remainder of the movie in absolute silence, save Papyrus’s singing at the musical numbers. He was absolutely entranced by it, and little by little, Sans felt his mood lifting. No one would have to know about his day, he figured. And to be honest, he preferred it that way.

* * *

 

 

The next day, Sans was lying in bed, staring at the ceiling. He didn’t work his night shift as he wasn’t scheduled, but Ross had called him and told him to take the day off. He had filled out the incident report on his phone, and emailed it off the same evening. It looked something like, “caught old hag, got hit in head with basket, lost faith in humanity” basically. Not as succinct, but the point came across he felt.

Papyrus was humming a happy tune to himself in the living room, tidying up as he always did. Honestly, Sans didn’t want to move much. The hit to the head hurt a lot more than he cared to admit, and his usual response of sleeping it off didn’t actually cure it for a change. Realistically, he was likely taking worse care of himself than usual – these sorts of things generally glanced off him. Hell, he was shocked he even got hit in the first place. Overlap or not, dexterity was definitely one of his stronger points… but he had been so damned focused on catching that dumb broad that he didn’t even register a basket swinging at him when he let her go.

 _My fault. I need to be more careful._ He thought. How shocked would she have been if she had dusted him right there with a well-placed slam to the head? _She’d probably leap with joy._

A part of him wished that she had. _No! That’s bullshit._ _Who would take care of Papyrus? Snap out of it._

He heaved a sigh, sitting up in bed, looking at the sheets crumpled around his feet. No use moping around, maybe he should do something productive. He poked his head out from his room.

“hey paps, you wanna do anything today?” he asked, hoping to get out of the house. Papyrus looked at him, his eyes widening for a moment in excitement, then his expression changing to one of concern.

“NO, I ACTUALLY NEED TO WORK ON A BETTER RESUME. _____ GAVE ME SOME FANTASTIC TIPS THAT WILL SURELY LAND ME EMPLOYMENT AT HER FRIEND’S PLACE!” he said, tapping his fingers against his chin. “SANS, IS EVERYTHING ALRIGHT WITH YOU? YOU SEEM…” Papyrus fumbled for a moment, trying to find the right word, “TIRED.”

“i’m always tired paps, you know me.” Sans said, shrugging. “ _bone-tired,_ you could say.”

“HAHA SANS, I HAVE NEVER HEARD THAT JOKE COME OUT OF YOUR MOUTH BEFORE.” Papyrus said sarcastically. Sans chuckled, and went to the door, grabbing his hoodie. “ARE YOU RUNNING AN ERRAND?”

“yeah, just want to go grab something real quick. you need anything while i’m out?”

“NO, I AM FINE. IF I THINK OF SOMETHING, I SHALL TEXT YOU!” he said, and gave Sans a little wave. Sans waved back, and walked out, shutting the door behind him.

Ok, now what? He was out of the house, but he didn’t really think of anywhere to go. He stood on the landing for a moment, pondering his options, when he looked across the way. He could go say hi to the neighbor, he guessed.

And then he remembered the previous day. _Perfect. That’d be a perfect ice breaker_. Damn, and he didn’t even need déjà vu this time to help him out! He walked down the stairs and outside, and looked around, trying to remember exactly where the closest corner shop was. He hung a left, and after a block he had found it.

He entered out of the cold, and went straight to the soda section. From the fridge, he grabbed two cokes. He paid without incident, which made him even _more_ pleased, and went back to their landing. He stood in front of the door for five minutes, thinking to himself: _What am I doing? She comes over once a week already, and you saw her yesterday. You might need to get out of the house, but she probably doesn’t need to see you. Ugh._

His face twisted into one of anger for a moment, and as fast as it appeared, it vanished. _It’s just a joke. It’s a joke. It’s fine._

He rang the doorbell, and waited. He looked up at the peephole, wishing that he could look through it to see inside almost. He leaned up against the side railing as casually as he possibly could when she opened the door. 

"Hey Sans, what's up?" she said, leaning against the frame. He grinned, and proudly held up the coke can.

"i owed you a coke from the other day, figured i'd make good on it." he said, waving it a little teasingly. She chuckled.

"So you did, I forgot about that. Thanks." she said, taking the can from him. She smiled at him, and he noticed she didn’t look at his hand this time. "You up to anything today?"

"nah. got home from work, was just gonna laze about. you know me." he said with a chuckle. She didn’t need to know he stayed home. "wasn't really expecting rain, i usually  _drought_  the weatherman." She rolled her eyes as she usually did, but he couldn’t help but notice the small smile she thought that she was hiding.

"Yeah yeah. Look, you wanna come in? I just made some tea, I can make you some as well if you want. I'm just reading. Nothing exciting." She was reading? Oh, that was perfect.

"yeah! sure. i gotta book i've been meaning to read. beats sleeping, right?"

"I dunno, nothing beats sleeping." She said, and he grinned.

"i knew there was a reason i liked you."

"And here I thought it was my immeasurable charm and good looks." She smirked. Sans laughed, and turned on his heel, heading back into his house.

“BACK SO SOON?” Papyrus asked, looking at Sans.

“actually, gonna go hang out with _____.” He said, hoping Papyrus would leave it be. Papyrus looked at Sans, his expression unreadable. Sans hurried into his room, grabbing the first book he saw – he knew he hadn’t read them either in a while, or at all. As he exited, Papyrus was still looking at him with that expression.

“WELL… HAVE A GOOD TIME.” Papyrus said simply, and Sans paused. That was uncharacteristic of him, and he stared at Papyrus for a moment.

“everything okay?” he asked.

“OH! YES! I AM JUST THINKING ABOUT WHICH METTATON MOVIE TO WATCH AFTER I FINISH MY RESUME!” he said, looking excited. Sans inwardly groaned, and was suddenly extremely glad he was ducking out.

“all of ‘em are pretty good, so you can’t go wrong, right?” Sans said behind him, as he slipped out the door.  As he went back, _____ was waiting for him in the entryway to her home. She motioned for him to come inside, and went into the kitchen to do something. Sans looked around for a moment, then decided to sit on the couch – it was stupidly comfortable. He went to reach for his book, when the neighbor’s head popped out from the kitchen.

"You're more than welcome to read in the living room, but let me tell you, the porch is much better. For real." She said with a smile. He looked at her quizzically, but then shrugged and made a big show of getting back up, and slogged over to the porch like it was the hardest thing he'd ever done.

He was surprised. He had seen the lights from his own balcony, but didn’t notice how… personal she had made it. Instead of the hard concrete like he had, the entire floor and sides were covered with a nice stained wood. How did she do that? Maybe she had an older version of the balcony? Lights were strung up on the ceiling, creating almost a curtain on one side of it, all bunching down into an incredibly dangerous looking clump of wires. Tiny lanterns hung randomly from the beams above, multicoloured and fragile. A small outside area rug sat beneath two comfortable looking chairs, and overall, it felt extremely homey.

"oh man. nice. it's like a crow's nest." he said, appreciating the sparkle.

"Well, I mean I know it's high up..." she said from the kitchen, her voice a little confused.

"no, i mean..." he stood in the patio doorway, "it's really cozy. but you got all these little personal shinies everywhere. heh."

"Oh! Yeah, I guess it is." She said, shrugging a shoulder. Sans politely waited in the door to the patio for her, and after a minute or two, she brought over two mugs of tea.

"Careful, it's hot." She said, flipping it handle first. Sans carefully took the cup from her hands, and the two went out onto the porch. Sans sat down in the chair, and practically sank into it. Damn, this was comfortable. Was everything in her house so soft and squishy? She sat there quietly looking at her mug of tea, then looked up at him. "I mean, can you feel if it's hot?" Sans looked surprised at the question.

"yeah, i can. can you?"

"Well, duh." She frowned a little. "Stupid question, sorry." Sans shrugged a single shoulder.

"as you said before, no harm, no foul." They both sat there awkwardly, a silence hanging between them. Sans could tell she felt bad for asking, so he decided to give her an out. "hey."

"What?" she asked.

"why do skeletons hate winter?"

"Huh? Why?" she asked, her voice wary.

"because the cold _goes right through them_." he said, sipping his tea and grinning. She let out a snort and a giggle. A giggle-snort?

"Oh jesus. You're so lame." She visibly relaxed, and sank into her own chair after grabbing her book. "So what're you reading?" Hell, Sans didn’t even know. He looked at the cover and chuckled to himself, and held it up for her to see.

"1000 knock knock jokes for the ages"

"That book is HUGE. That's ridiculous!" she exclaimed.

"well what're YOU reading then?" he asked. She held her book up slowly, looking immensely embarrassed. ‘Vampire Detective: Blood Hunt’ is what the title read. He couldn’t help but snort, trying to keep the laughter to himself.

"oh, well that's far more adult."

"Shut up!" she said, "It was $5. It's not that bad, really. The main vampire is about to go save his human girlfriend from the vampire hunters. But he doesn't know she's a supernatural detective. All very serious stuff." She said, nodding to herself.

"very serious. all that drama sounds like a real  _pain in the neck_."

"I'm ignoring you now." she said, making quite the show of opening her book. Sans opened his ridiculously enormous joke book and started reading as well. It wasn’t exactly what he had wanted to read, but that was his own fault for not checking to see what he had picked up. Still, it was always good to brush up on his one-liners; he felt as if some of them were getting a little stale.

The rain continued to fall, creating a relaxing symphony of sound as the two read in silence. The cars passed by, their treads making an almost musical noise as they skirted the water, and the various hum and drum of the city chiming into it’s chorus. Sans mostly spent his time in his room at home, and so he was extremely pleased with how nice it was out on her porch. Occasionally he’d chuckle at a joke, and she’d inquire as to what it was – and of course he couldn’t help but tell her – and sometimes she’d let out a tiny gasp, and he knew she got to something good and was dying to know what… and just like that, they shared in each other’s company for a few hours as the world passed them by together.

 _This is nice._ Sans thought, his eyes becoming slightly heavier. _Is it so bad to want this to last longer?_ He looked at her, completely ensconced in her book, and he felt his lids flutter. Shutting them for just a second wouldn’t hurt.

When he opened them again, it was obvious he had fallen asleep for some time. The day had changed into night, and the thousands of tiny lights that draped across the porch had been turned on. It was like warm stars glowing above him. He smiled to himself, and realized she had placed a blanket on him at some point to keep him warm.

Why were people being so kind to him suddenly? It made him uneasy.

"i like the lights, they're nice." he said quietly.

"Thanks." she replied simply.

"kinda romantic, don't you think?" he said lazily. It was a completely flippant comment, but she way she froze made him rethink what he said. That wasn’t the intended effect.

"Nothing says 'romance' like electrical fires." She said, her voice sounding unsure. "You know, I do this when no one's over too."

"ah, so you're into self-romance, then." He responded with a sly smile. Hopefully that would make her realize he was joking.

"Gross! You're gross. That's gross." She said as Sans started chuckling. Thank god she had a good sense of humour. _That could have ended in disaster._ He looked down to the stand between them, and saw that she had poured him another cup of tea.

"thanks for more tea. and the blanket. that was nice." he said, enjoying the warmth of the blanket. He felt at peace, at ease.

And he didn’t like it. He needed to leave.

"Yeah, well if I knew you were going to be an ass, I would have wrapped you up in carpet instead, and thrown you over the balcony." She muttered. "No one woulda said nothin'." Sans smirked, then stood up, folding his blanket.

"You taking off?" she asked, her voice laced with disappointment. For a moment, Sans felt bad. But only for a moment.

"yeah, i told papyrus i'd be over here, but we usually eat dinner together. didn't tell him how long i'd be. i'll see you saturday?" he asked, hoping that would excuse him.

"Yeah! Of course. We're meeting up around 5:00 at O'Henry's, is that OK?" She looked for approval, it seemed. He nodded, figuring public meetups were better than some sort of awkward dinner party.

"definitely. we'll be there. and hey..” he said, and the words tumbled out of his mouth before he could stop them. "this was nice. thanks. if you don't mind me coming over again sometime..."

_Damnit._

"Anytime." She said, genuinely surprising him. "I'm trying to stop watching so much damned TV. Toll entry is one coke." She said, smiling at him.

"thanks." was all he could muster. This was more than just human and monster interaction. This was honest to god _friendship._ He could feel his magic coursing through him faster than normal, his soul pulsating with an odd sensation. Maybe there could be something good in this world. And he should just finally accept it.

 

"See you Saturday." She said enthusiastically, waving at him.

"see ya." He said simply, and left, locking the door behind him. As he entered the apartment, his chest was aching almost. Why was it so hard? She was being so kind to him, and he needed to realize there was no secret agenda.

She wasn’t going to greet him with dust covered hands. She wasn’t like _them_.

Papyrus had fallen asleep on the couch in the middle of his movies, Sans’s dinner sitting on the dining room table, untouched. Sans carefully wrapped a blanket around his brother, and sat down at the dinner table, spinning his fork into his pasta.

_Friends, huh?_

 

* * *

 

It was almost one in the morning when Sans heard a loud voice coming from the stairwell. His window had been open so he could listen to the rain, and he heard the singing coming from the street. It was pretty awful, and extremely off-key. The sound grew, until it reached what sounded like his landing.

There was no mistaking it, the singing was definitely female. Good lord, was it her?

He immediately sat up, pushing his covers off of him. He went to his front door and opened it to see what was going on,  and saw another female holding his neighbor up so she didn’t fall over. She turned to look at Sans, and froze in place. Sans looked at _____, concerned.

"hey, you ok?" he asked.

"She's just a little drunk." The female replied, helping her into the house without saying anything else.

"Yooooooooooooooooou!" ______ shouted, pointing at Sans as Jackie literally dragged her into the house, and slammed the door. Sans was absolutely nonplussed. What the hell just happened? Was she drunk?

Heh, she was drunk. Cute.

Sans went back into his room, listening to see if he could hear anything else, but it was just the rain and traffic. He hoped she was okay. That was likely her friend she had talked about before, so she was probably in good hands.

The noise of the city slowly lulled Sans into sleep. And for once, it was a peaceful one.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> MAN I JUST WANTED TO GET THIS OUT HERE YOU GO HAVE FUN AHAHAHAHAAHA
> 
> Feedback always loved and appreciated!


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sans finally has enough of this shit.

Sans was unusually nervous about Saturday. There was something mildly off about the events that transpired this time around, and it’s not like he could consult his past experiences to see what it was. He knew he went out and met his neighbor’s friends around this time, and that was fine – but something was different with Papyrus. He was stocking some cans in the soup aisle and accidentally dropped one and cursed silently to himself. Nerves were getting the better of him right now, and he needed to find a comfortable constant to settle into.

What could it be that was changed? Papyrus was happy, and that was his primary concern. It wasn’t a tingle, like a sense of danger or anything, but something irritably _different._ On the same note, it was probably his fault; he was changing things, wasn’t following the normal route that he had before. Dumb, little things: Lefts instead of rights, laughs instead of silence, jokes instead of polite smiles. What the hell was prompting him to branch out and be such an idiot?

 _I can’t read my own fucking past is what it is, duh._ He thought miserably to himself. He put away what felt like the millionth can of chicken noodle soup, and prayed that there would be a fuckload of déjà vu at the bar tonight. He needed the help, he needed people to like him. Either way, he’d be on his best behaviour, tonight was not the night to deviate from life’s plan.

On the plus side, work had been going extremely well. He could tell through the overlaps that Ross was treating him differently. Better. In fact, he took him out for a drink the other night, and they had a fantastic time. Sans was pretty mindblown, first his neighbor was an absolute sweetheart, then his own boss was actually a pretty great guy. He wasn’t sure if it was a “hey-I’m-sorry-you-were-assaulted” drink, or a “let’s-be-friends” drink, but by the end of the night they were both laughing about the dumb shit that happened at work, and Sans felt a little more at ease with him. At least there was one upside to doing things a little differently, he supposed.

As weird as it sounded, he was looking forward to seeing his neighbor in a more social setting, if you will. She was fun on spaghetti nights, and he enjoyed the idea of having reading nights as well – she was growing on him, just a little. He finished emptying his pallet and went to the back, ready to clock out. Papyrus was supposed to meet him at work, and then the two of them were going to head over to pick up his neighbor from work and head to the bar together. He was appreciative that she was going with them, so they didn’t have to awkwardly enter alone and look for them. He went into the bathroom to change out of his uniform, and then strolled up the front, waving to his co-workers on his way out. _Stay friendly, stay in their mind._ Good ol’ Sans, just your friendly neighborhood skeleton.

Papyrus was outside, clacking away at his phone. He had downloaded some sort of puzzle game on it earlier in the week, and had barely looked up from it whenever he had a full charge on it. Sans grinned – his brother definitely had style. A jewel purple button up, matched with a light grey pullover vest and some slacks. And finally, he got to wear his wing-tips! He knew how excited he was when he got to wear his wing-tips. Sans definitely was more casual about it, but this whole meeting was to impress the guy at the restaurant to get Papyrus a job, so it made sense.

“lookin’ good paps.” Sans said, walking up to his brother. Papyrus looked up and grinned broadly.

“THANK YOU BROTHER! DO YOU THINK IT IS APPROPRIATE ATTIRE FOR AN OUTING?” he asked, turning a little to show it off. Sans nodded.

“definitely. fancy but not too fancy, right?”

“MOST EXCELLENT! ALTHOUGH I’M NOT SURE YOU’RE THE BEST JUDGE OF FASHION.” He said, laughing a little. Sans laughed as well, and elbowed Papyrus in the ribs.

“hey you know me, comfortable is where it’s at. you ready to go pick up our pasta pal?” Sans asked, and Papyrus nodded enthusiastically.

“OF COURSE! LEAD THE WAY, AS I’M NOT FAMILIAR WITH HER PLACE OF WORK.” Papyrus said, and Sans nodded and lead the way. Papyrus went back to his puzzle game, glancing up every now and again to see where they were going. Sans ignored the glances and stares their way, feeling a little more upbeat than usual for whatever reason.

He entered the shop, the bell tinkling overhead as they entered. His neighbor and her boss turned to see who had entered, and he gave a small wave – she was staring at Papyrus, her face looking slightly impressed at his attire.

“WOWIE, THERE’S SO MUCH GRAPE JUICE HERE!” Papyrus exclaimed, looking around. Sans laughed inwardly, and noticed the neighbor flinched slightly.

“Hey guys!” she called out, and crossed over to them quickly. “Let me go grab my coat, and I’m good to go.” She smiled, looking at her boss and then motioned to the two of them as he stared awkwardly. “Peter, this is Sans and Papyrus, my neighbors, and my _friends._ ” Sans caught the stress in the last word, and immediately his guard was up.

Peter continued his stare until she coughed, and then he caught himself. “I’ve heard so much about you guys.” He said flatly. “Nice to meet you.” Sans controlled the tic in his eye, the insincerity practically slapping him in the face. His neighbor went to the back to grab something, and Sans stood there for a moment.

 _You wait outside._ She comes out, everything is fine.

Sans stood his ground.

"same. all good stuff, same i'm sure." said Sans, and he extended a hand – it wasn’t a gesture of friendship, it was a declaration of intent. Peter’s eyes flickered down to it, then back to Sans’s face. Sans left it there for a second, then shrugged. His point had been made. "nice business, by the way."

"Yeah?" said Peter, his tone monotone. _Friendly guy, I actually meant that._

"yeah. bought a wine from you a while ago. really good. riesling, i think. _____ here helped me pick it out. good stuff." _Rub it in his face._ He thought.

Peter's wheels were turning in his head, Sans could see it. Sans left his easy smile plastered on his face, not that it was a genuine one anyway, and Papyrus was poking his head in an empty display barrel.

  
"She's a good kid." Peter finally responded.

"she is." Sans replied. He was being protective, Sans was a threat. Was he related to her? He’d have to find out later.

They sat in silence, in some sort of mutual understanding until she emerged from the back.

"Good god, is this rain ever going to let up? I mean, I like it, don't get me wrong but jesus, my hair is going nuts." She said, patting her hair down and looking cross. She looked at Sans, then Peter, and then to Papyrus who was exploring the store without a care in the world. She sucked in a breath, then stepped next to Sans.

"Alright, well, let's get going then. I'll see you bright and early - unfortunately - tomorrow Peter." She grinned at Peter, and suddenly hooked her arm through Sans, startling him. "C'mon buddy, let's blow this popsicle stand. Papyrus!" Sans looked down quickly, feeling his face heat.

"COMING! ARE WE LEAVING NOW?" he said, holding a big t-shirt that Sans couldn’t read.

"Yeah, go put that back. We're taking off."

"OKIE DOKIE!" he responded, neatly folding the shirt and coming over them. He looked at Peter, then made the connection. "THANK YOU FOR EMPLOYING MY GOOD FRIEND _____! SHE IS A KIND PERSON. YOU MUST ALSO BE VERY KIND IN TURN." he grabbed Peter's hand, and shook it enthusiastically. Sans’s head shot up, ready to intercept - Peter stood there shocked for a moment, then started laughing.

"Have a good night, guys." he said, half-smiling. "I'll see you in the morning _____."

The three exited into the light drizzle, leaving the smell of must and disdain behind.

* * *

 

Her arm was still hooked through his, and he had taken note of it. Oh, how he had taken note. It wasn’t that he thought it meant anything, but he felt a complex surge of emotion flooding through him as they walked down the street. She did it to get them out of the shop, but her gentle touch was reaching somewhere deep inside him at the moment – it was casual, easy, familiar. Was there an overlap? Had they done this before? She was just his neighbor, she was _human_ , she was a _friend_ , _he barely knew her_.

Or did he? Did he know her in the past? Were they better friends? Sans immediately shook the notion from his head, the idea that he had established anything beyond basic friendship was asinine. Regardless, he enjoyed the feel of her against him, and kept his mouth shut.

After a short while, Sans suddenly felt her yank her arm away from him. He looked at her, studying her face as it flushed a light red, but decided against saying something. He figured she didn’t realize he was still holding onto him, which was no big deal. Papyrus was talking about something, pasta he thought, but his mind was swimming with thoughts. He wasn’t feeling the overlap right now, and he had to be cautious –he didn’t want to fuck this up for Papyrus, but even more, he didn’t want to fuck this up with his friend. He remained silent, and kept it as such the remainder of the walk to the pub.

As they entered the pub, Sans felt all eyes on him. He could tell his neighbor felt mildly uncomfortable, and he felt a twinge of guilt at that, but tried to project an aura of calm. San’s neighbor looked around for a moment, as if searching for someone, then seemingly spotted them. It seemed she saw them, as Sans noted her face melted into a smitten smile – ah, she had a boyfriend? Or a love interest, at least. Sans turned his head to see who it was, and saw a man waving to them, beckoning them over.

Sans’s entire body froze on the spot, a chill running down his spine.

 _Friendly looking guy._ Have some drinks, have some laughs.

 _You need to kill him. Kill him this time._ Rigid inflexibility. Everything is awkward.

 _Fuck him. He’s scum._ Polite, clipped conversation with him, but friendly otherwise.

 _Shit._ Who the fucking hell _was_ this guy? This was a major concern, and a major problem. Sans groaned inwardly, his emotions surging, threatening to overtake him.

"Hey! _____! Over here!" he shouted, waving to the group. Sans wanted to scream.

The neighbor waved to Papyrus and Sans, signaling for them to follow her over to the booth, and they walked over. “Hey guys!” she said, sounding far more chipper than normal. “So, these are my friends, Sans and Papyrus!” She motioned to two brothers respectively. “And this is Will, Hannah, Jackie and Kyle.”

Sans heard the polite hellos and hi’s coming from the table, but most of it wasn’t registering. His attention was narrowing in on Will as subtly as he possibly could. Could he figure this out? Fuck, he couldn’t ignore it anymore. He was reading his goddamned journal when he got home. He couldn’t ignore something as strong as this. His neighbor slid in next to Will, and Papyrus sat next to the lanky ginger across the way. He sat next to his neighbor, trying to relax as much as possible.

“How was work?” Will asked her, patting down some of her hair that had been mussed by the rain. She giggled like a child, and Sans inwardly frowned. This shouldn’t bother him, but something about it did.

"Ah, it was fine. Peter might be working with a local business. Some restaurant that I guess bottles their own stuff. I'll have to taste it later. That'll be the third place in the city, if it works out, which would be awesoooome." The girl named Hannah snorted.

They continued talking, when Sans’s eyes locked with Jackie’s.

 _Laughing. Drinking. Friendly._ A great time with this one, her boyfriend? Husband? Exchanges numbers.

 _She’s a good friend. She’s trustworthy._ You have a great time again, you exchange numbers.

 _She remembers, somehow. She’s one of those. She’s trustworthy._ Again, you exchange numbers.

The way she’s staring at Sans causes him to believe she’s having déjà vu of her own right now. He wishes he could tell her, explain to her what was going on, but he can’t. But he knows that she can feel that they’ve met before, and she’s trying to place it right now – and in her mind, she’s thinking, _‘When the fuck did I meet a skeleton?’_

They continue to stare at each other for a minute or two, until Jackie gives up.

Sans couldn’t help but notice as Will slid his arms behind both Hannah and the neighbor after his sudden stretch, and he was pretty sure Hannah was his girlfriend. Maybe Sans had misread the situation? Watching his neighbor’s face turn beet red, he thought to himself – no, he read it perfectly.

He nudged her, trying to save her. “drink?”

“Please.” she said, her voice almost desperate. “A stout would be great. Surprise me.”  
  
"anyone else?" Sans spoke up. Will already had a drink, but the other three looked a little surprised. "seriously, first round on me." _Make them like you._

"A Sex on the Beach." Hannah responded. _The hell is that?_

"Tequila Sunrise." said Jackie. _Ah, I like her already._

"Uhh..." said Kyle. "Gin and tonic?" _Simple guy._

"WATER, PLEASE!" said Papyrus. _Of course._

"got it." and with that, Sans got up to headed to the order the drinks. He ignored the wayward glances, and confidently stepped up to the bar, leaning into the wooden counter. “hey.”

“Hey.” the bartender said, clearly trying to seem unphased by the skeleton in front of him.

“i need a few drinks, a uh, tequila sunrise, sex on the beach, gin n’ tonic, whiskey on the rocks, water and your callaway stout.”

“Sure thing.” The bartender said, and quickly whisked away to fulfill the order.

“That’s a tall order for a short guy.” A patron said next to Sans. Sans chuckled, and looked at the guy.

“well that’s a low blow.” Sans said, and the guy laughed. Sans and the guy chatted casually for a minute, and Sans’s guard began to ease slightly. This city was treating him well, almost _too_ well. But what would it hurt to enjoy it? Maybe that’s why he wouldn’t let himself know what was coming, because he wanted to just freaking enjoy this iteration before the eventual reset. Just put it on auto-pilot, play around, have some goddamned _fun._

How long had it even been since he had had fun? He sighed, handing his cash over to the bartender and thanking him for the drinks, scooping them up as carefully as possible. He was always worrying about one thing or another, when the reset was happening… fuck, why not just enjoy it this time around?

Sans came back to the table, his mood having bounced all over the place that day, but at the moment it had come to an all-time high. He slid in next to his neighbor cheerfully, placing a beer in front of her.

"one stout for you, one sex on the beach, one tequila sunrise, one gin'n'tonic, and a water for ya bro." he said, distributing the drinks. Everyone thanked him happily, and the chattering resumed. Sans’s browbone raised, noticing his neighbor’s face trying to return to a normal shade of pink.

"What're you drinking?" she asked, clearly trying to divert attention from herself.

"whiskey." he said with a grin, and took a big gulp.

"Ok, I don't mean to be rude, but how do you do that?" Kyle suddenly asked, and Sans looked up from his drink.

"Kyle!" she shot across the table.

"do what?" Sans asked, amused at Kyle’s bluntness. He didn’t mind questions, honestly. It was one thing for someone to be curious, it was another for someone to simply be scared. He would like to say he was used to answering things, but on average, people didn’t ask him much – they were either too polite, or too terrified.

"Drink? Eat? I guess?" Kyle said, looking a little embarrassed. Sans could tell Jackie was admonishing him under the table for his question, and he chuckled a little.

Sans took in a deep breath, and put his glass down. Time to get real. "you really wanna know?"

The table was quiet. _You got them._

He did his lame ass jazz hands. " _maaaaagic_." Papyrus and his neighbor laughed, and the rest chimed in after. Sans grinned.

The topic was dropped, but Kyle still mouthed "I'm sorry" to Sans. Sans politely nodded and winked at him. No harm done, and it was a genuine question. While he wouldn’t mind getting into the technical aspect of it all someday, they had just met, and he wasn’t sure giving a magical anatomy lesson on how the fundamentals of energy conversion would go over well with a bunch of drunk humans.

Sans sat back for the majority of the evening, participating occasionally in the chatter, but mostly observing. It wasn’t that he didn’t want to talk, but that he was merely enjoying the company. _Me? Enjoying company? What weird timeline are we in?_ Hell, he hadn’t even been experiencing any serious déjà vu, but was still surprisingly comfortable. Either way, he was having a good time. Still, every time he looked at Will, his hackles raised. Everything about him was screaming ‘danger’, and he knew his instincts were never wrong.

Sans watched as his neighbor and Will chatted quietly about something, and then Will heaved a giant sigh. "I will. For you." he said, and planted a kiss on the top of her head. She immediately tried to hide her face, turning directly into Sans – which only made her turn what looked like a shade or two redder.

"you're pretty amusing when you drink." he said, inwardly chuckling.

"Shut up." she murmured, chugging the rest of her beer. Sans ribbed her. "You don't even seem half as drunk as me. You should drink more."

"i would but..." he swirled his glass around. "it's a  _whiskey business_." She snorted, and started laughing.

"You are so dumb, you're the best." She said, suddenly hugging Sans. He stiffened under the sudden contact, but the reminded himself that it was fine – it was casual. He didn’t hug back, but he let her hug him, and relaxed slightly. She didn’t move though, and was seemingly resting on him… did she fall asleep?

"Did she just fall asleep on you?" Hannah asked. "She does that. She fell asleep on me one time, mid-sentence when she drank this much." She reached out across the table to tap her, and she jerked away from him.

"Oh jeez. No! I'm awake! I'm just. Yes! Jackie! Shots?" she slurred. Jackie grinned maniaclly.

"SHOTS."

Sans and Papyrus exchanged a look briefly, and Sans wondered what he had gotten himself into. He looked at his whiskey glass, and silently reminded himself to keep himself sober. While it was tempting to join in the revelry, he didn’t want to get drunk around the humans. He didn’t know them well enough, not yet. A slight buzz would be fine, safe, but anything past that was asking for trouble.

Jackie and his neighbor quickly managed to acquire shots, and were getting positively sloshed. Sans learned more about his neighbor in the timespan of four hours than he had in the month and some change had been having dinners with her. She loved dogs, she was allergic to cats, her favourite colour was red – or was it orange? (she couldn’t remember) as well as her favourite desert was tiramisu. She also really liked lumberjacked out men in flannel with nice calves, and she was currently wearing bright pink underwear with leopard spots and a matching bra. Barely even the tip of the iceberg, as she was rambling off information about herself while bouncing around in conversation, and Sans couldn’t help but notice how ridiculously _touchy_ she got when she drank.

But he didn’t mind it too much. She didn’t flinch when she came into contact with him, and he silently appreciated it. Papyrus was having a fantastic time as well, even though he was just drinking water. The lanky ginger kid and him seemed to be really hitting it off. He was trying to stamp down the uneasy feeling in his gut about Will however, and was smiling and nodding appropriately at jokes. What put him more on edge about the feeling, was that this was the guy who was supposed to be hiring Papyrus; the fact that he would even entertain the notion of killing someone in _any_ timeline frightened him. Was this guy secretly a monster hater? Did he dust Papyrus? God, he couldn’t go through that again. Never again.

His mind was made up. He was definitely reading his journal tonight, regardless of what his dumb fucking self wanted. If his brother was in danger, then that was an unacceptable problem, and he wasn’t going to passively let it go by. Not anymore.

Sans sighed and leaned back into his seat.

“Somethin’ on your mind?” his neighbor slurred, learning into him, curious. He chuckled a little.

“wondering how you’re such a lightweight.” He said, smirking. She whapped him on the shoulder, looking mock offended.

“I’ll have you know I’m not a lightweight, we’ve been doing many shots. All the shots. So many shots.” She said, giggling. Her chin was resting on his shoulder, and he wondered how comfortable she could possibly be. “Like twenty thousand shots.”

“that sounds like a lotta shots. you sure you’re keeping count?” he asked, and she laughed again. Will was looking at the two of them, and his face looked mildly irritated.

“Listen, _pal_. I might not be a mathematician but I know what’s going on.” she said, one of her eyes closing. “Don’t try an’ trick me. I’m onto you. Like super onto you. I got yo’ numba.”

“don’t think you do, actually.” Sans said, chuckling. Now that he thought about it, they hadn’t exchanged numbers, had they? She was clearly thinking about it too, and her eyes widened.

“Oh my god! I don’t! Do you have a phone?” she said, and Sans dug into his pocket, pulling it out. She stared at it, then him. “Oh wow, you have a phone. That’s so cool. A skeleton with a phone.” She started laughing to herself like she made some sort of joke, and she swiped it from his hand. “Jesus, this thing is ancient. A Galaxy S3? You gotta fax machine in your jacket too?” Sans nabbed it back from her, and rolled his eyes.

“nothin’ wrong with it, it does what it’s supposed to. makes calls, lets me text.”

“Yeah but you can’t play games or do snapchats n’shit prolly, you might as well use a rotary phone, jeez.” She said, and leaned her weight into him because she turned too quickly. He stiffened in response, not used to the contact, then tried to immediately relax himself. She was drunk, so she was all over the place, and he was the closest thing in proximity. But he could tell, the way that she was looking around sometimes, and the way she moved – she wanted to lean into Will. Doubly so, it was obvious that Will wanted her to lean into him, and she was instead leaning into Sans.

Humans were complicated.

* * *

 

  
Sans had managed to amuse everyone that evening with every bad pun he could think of that evening, the amount of laughing and simultaneous groaning was fairly impressive. He was pleased, as it seemed this group of humans were easy going, and didn’t seem to mind too much their monster-nature. Papyrus and Kyle were already making plans to hang out, and his neighbor had somehow convinced Will to interview Papyrus. Will went stalking up to Papyrus, tapping him on the chest with some form of authority, and told him that he should come down to the restaurant on Monday. Papyrus was absolutely thrilled, scooping Will up into a crushing hug.

The dynamic duo had managed to drink themselves silly, with Jackie being propped up by Kyle, and Sans’s neighbor being helped out of the booth by Will.

"I have wooooork." She whined at Will, then narrowed her eyes at Will. Jackie was positively cackling with delight.

"I know. Let's get you home. Hannah, I'm gonna make sure she's safe, I'll meet you at home?" Will said, looking at Hannah. Hannah looked incredibly displeased – Sans was baffled at how Will wasn’t picking up on the jealousy vibe emanating from his girlfriend.

"She's  _fine_  Will. She's left here in worse states on her own."

"'xactly." The neighbor said to Will. "Hannah's in the know. Hannah knows. Hannah knows aaall." She booped her own nose and pointed at Hannah with a wink. Sans held in a laugh, this girl was a riot. He figured he’d step in and save the situation.

"we got this." Sans offered, coming up from behind the group. Will just looked at him, unsure for a moment. "we live across from her. it makes sense, right?"

"I SHALL CARRY HER ON MY BACK!" Papyrus chimed in, extremely excited.

"Please. Guys. I can wa-aaaaa!!" she started, unable to finish as Papyrus had lifted her in a single deft movement and deposited her onto his back.  "Oh god. This is happening. I've hit rock bottom. I'm like a little boozy backpack." Will and Jackie started laughing. Jackie looked at Kyle.

"Why don't you carry meeeee?" she asked, halfheartedly trying to clamber onto his back. Kyle pushed her away playfully.

"Because unlike some people, we own a car, and I'm driving, my dear. And with that, I bid you inebriates adieu. Nice to meet you guys." he said to Sans and Papyrus, bowing with a flourish. Jackie giggled and curtsied, giving her friend a sloppy smooch on the cheek on the way out.

"well, let's get going before the rain starts coming down again." said Sans, looking at his brother. Papyrus nodded in agreement.

  
"INDEED! WE SHALL GET OUR GOOD FRIEND HOME SAFELY AND SECURELY!" Papyrus spun on his heels. "IT WAS A PLEASURE TO MEET YOU, WILL AND HANNAH. I SHALL BE AT YOUR ESTABLISHMENT ON MONDAY! I THANK YOU FOR THE OPPORTUNITY!"

  
"Nice meeting you too, Papyrus." Will smiled. "See you Monday, 8am!"

Two skeletons and a drunk girl exited the bar, as though setting up for what seemed like a bad joke.

"THAT WAS A MOST WONDERFUL OUTING WE HAD TONIGHT! YOU HAVE VERY NICE FRIENDS!" he enthused, bopping along in his usual manner. "I PARTICULARLY LIKE THE KYLE ONE, HE IS VERY FUNNY AND KNOWS A LOT ABOUT COOKING!"

"Yeah... he's a... urp... he's a foodie, I guess." she said, Sans noting she was looking a little pale. Oh jeez, was she gonna puke?

"A FOODIE? WHAT IS THAT?" asked Papyrus.

"It's a... oh.. Papyrus, ask me things when I don't feel like this." She mumbled. Sans looked up at her for a second.

 _Keep walking._ She pukes all over Papyrus’s head. There’s a lot of crying from both parties.

 _Stop walking._ She takes a breather on the sidewalk.

  
"hey, you okay?" he said, his hand half-reaching out to her, before returning to his side. "paps, stop for a second."

"WHAT? OKAY." Papyrus stopped, and she clumsily slid down off of his back. Sans watched her slowly sit on the wet pavement, and sink her head into her hands. It wasn’t just posture of someone who was just feeling sick, it was the posture of someone who was struggling with sadness. He felt a twinge of familiarity, and seemingly sank into himself. Poor girl.

 

She began to wobble slightly, and he recognized the signs – despite never having to throw up himself, having been around bars plenty he had seen it enough times to know what was about to happen. It didn’t hurt that the déjà vu was violently strong at the moment. He reached forward, pulling her hair back out of her face, and patiently waited. Right on cue, her head bobbed down, and she retched the twenty thousand shots onto the street.

"yup." he said to no one in particular.

"I'm sorry!" she said between gasps of air, Sans still carefully holding her hair. Papyrus started up behind the two of them, crying that he had ‘broke the human’, and Sans was trying to calm the both of them down. After she had finished emptying her stomach, she sniffled and looked up at him, absolutely mortified.

"all good?" asked Sans, pulling a napkin out of his pocket. _So that’s why I took it earlier._ He handed it to her, and she took it with a clear look of appreciation.

"As good as good is gonna get. Oh god. I'm so sorry. I'm so, so sorry." she said, humiliated. Papyrus looked near to tears, crouched down by her.

"OH _____! I'M GLAD YOU'RE OK! PLEASE LET ME TAKE YOU HOME NOW!" he cried out, his eyes watery. She smiled at him weakly.

"I'm ok Papyrus. I just... had way too much to drink. I should know better. It's ok." Sans reached down to help her up, and she wobbled a little, so he held onto her arm to help her keep balance. "Thanks. You're awesome."

  
He just smiled at her, feeling that surge of emotion again. _What was this?_ It made him feel uncomfortable.

  
"YOU ARE IN NO STATE TO WALK, I SHALL CONTINUE TO CARRY YOU." Papyrus exclaimed, as she separated from Sans and attempted to walk on her own. Her straight line was less than impressive.

  
"Papyrus, if I have to ride on your back again, I'm gonna puke again. I'm good. Seriously."

Papyrus didn’t particularly care, and he picked her up in his arms, carrying her bridal-style.

  
"IS THIS BETTER?" he asked, starting to walk. Sans chuckled.

"Yeah. That's fine. That's fine Papyrus." She said, clearly giving up. She nuzzled her face into the collar of his neck, and her eyes started to flutter, and she quickly passed out.

“looks like she fell asleep.” Sans said, his head nodding to her. Papyrus looked down as best he could and quickened his pace.

“WE MUST GET HER HOME TO SAFETY.” He said as quietly as possible. “I DO NOT UNDERSTAND WHY YOU WOULD DRINK SO MUCH YOU WOULD ENDANGER YOURSELF LIKE THIS.” Sans frowned. He understood both sides of the coin; drinking this much because you were having too much fun, and having no fun.

“yeah.” Sans responded, trying to keep his mood light. He didn’t want to reflect on it too much right now, to be honest. He had had a good night, and he was going to figure out what the hell was going on finally.  After a short while, they had reached their apartment, and they got to their landing.

“SHOULD WE PUT HER IN HER OWN BED?” Papyrus suggested. Sans thought about it for a moment.

“honestly, i dunno how she’d feel about us going through her purse and putting her into her house, even if it was good intentioned. let’s just set her up on the couch, we can keep an eye on her and make sure she doesn’t throw up again.”

“GOOD THINKING BROTHER!” Papyrus said, and entered their apartment. Sans went into the linen closet and pulled out some blankets, placing them out on the couch, then grabbed his pillow off his bed and put it on there as well. Papyrus very carefully placed her on the couch, and gently wrapped her in the blankets like a big, drunk burrito. Papyrus pulled a chair up, and sat in it, looking at her for a minute.

“you can go to bed if you want bro, i’ll stay up with her. “ Sans offered.

“ARE YOU SURE?” Papyrus asked, his face looking concerned. “YOU MIGHT FALL ASLEEP AS WELL.”

“nah, i have some light reading to do.” He said, winking. Papyrus nodded and stood, and gave his brother a big hug.

“ALRIGHT SANS. PLEASE WAKE ME IF YOU NEED ME. I LIKE OUR NEW FRIEND, PLEASE DO NOT LET HER DIE.” Papyrus said, his voice wavering slightly. Sans looked up at his brother, surprised.

“hey, paps. she’s fine. she’s just sick to her stomach. it’s a human thing. i’ll stay awake until she wakes up, how’s that?”

“I WOULD GREATLY APPRECIATE THAT.” Papyrus said, and took a huge sniff. “THANK YOU!”

“of course. get to sleep.” Papyrus marched off to his bedroom, and Sans let out a heavy sigh. He’d definitely be reading, but light reading was highly unlikely. He padded off into his bedroom after about twenty minutes or so, and grabbed the journal off his desk, bringing it back out into the living room. He unceremoniously plopped it onto the end table and looked at his unconscious guest.

“prolly should take care of you first.” He said with a small sigh. He went into the bathroom and grabbed a washcloth, ran it under some cold water then squeezed it out. Flipping the kettle on, he placed the cold washcloth on her head as he waited for the water to boil. He wasn’t 100% sure the washcloth was what she needed, but he had heard from other humans that that sort of thing made them feel better. His mind began to drift when the kettle began whistling and he almost fell out of his seat, and ran into the kitchen before it woke her up, taking it off the stove. How did she like her tea? He didn’t remember, so he just put a teabag in it and hoped for the best.

Sitting on the floor cross legged, he grabbed his journal off the end table and looked at it. Shit. Well here he was, breaking his own rules. Hell, he needed to though, his reaction to Will was unsettling. The overlap was so painfully strong, that he had to carefully monitor his own responses with him. Sure, he could joke and be casual, but the overwhelming feeling of hatred from the other timelines slowly began spilling into his thoughts. Conflicting still, was the timeline where he genuinely liked the guy, and they got along. What had gone so horribly wrong? He _had_ to know. Maybe he could prevent it, maybe it was something avoidable. Maybe…

His hands went to the cover, thumbing across the worn front. If anything, he was glad he didn’t age like this thing. It had definitely taken a beating. He took a sharp intake of breath, and opened the book to the worn bookmark, the indicator of where he left off last.

 _I know you’re not listening to yourself, idiot._ It read. God fucking damnit.

 _But that’s fine. I wouldn’t listen to myself, I know I wouldn’t. So this is here to safeguard against my own stupid curiousity. I’m pretty sure the problem is that guy you ran into today._ Damnit, was he always this smug? Yeah, he was always this smug.

_Listen, me. Don’t go back past this bookmark. Don’t read it. What you need to know is what I’m gonna tell you on this page. Don’t fuck this up, I mean it. This is for you. You have a chance, a chance to be truly happy._

_Don’t trust Will, not with ______. Papyrus is safe. He’ll never hurt him. But never, ever trust Will with ______. You’ve probably figured out she’s not a blip on your radar, because you’re not an idiot. She’s a good person, and my advice to you is to protect her from that asshole, no matter what the cost is to you personally._

Were you serious? You were giving yourself future advice on this unconscious boozehound on your couch? I mean, she was a blast, and she was definitely a good friend so far, but still –

_I’m gonna write down some dates, keep track of them. You need to be around for them. I’m not going to tell you what to do, because shit needs to change. Weird, right?_

_But I will tell you the **one** day you need to be available, and what you need to do. And it’s fucking important. _

_Do yourself a favour. Don’t flip the page until you’ve reached the end of these dates. I know me, I’ll be a nervous wreck otherwise._

_You got it this time. We got it this time. In the meantime, please._

_Be happy for a change._

Below was a series of dates and times, along with locations. Absolutely nothing was written alongside them, and Sans’s hand clawed at the air in frustration. Are you fucking serious? Sans turned the page in anger.

_I said don’t flip the page, jackass. Stop being a stubborn piece of shit._

“rrrgggh!” Sans shouted, and threw his journal across the room. God damnit! Where was the usual information? The observations, the timestamps, the theories? The actions and results? This was just a fucking loveletter to himself, not an actual useful piece of information. He knew the journal prior to the bookmark held his previous timelines, and he _could_ just go back and read those.

But did he want to? Fuck. If he was keeping himself this blind, there was a good reason behind it all. And more importantly, he thought for some reason that he could be happy. Happy was good, right?

His head sunk into his hands, and he felt more defeated now than he had before. So he had to prevent something awful from happening, _great_. Sans the Saviour, once again. Did he keep fucking this up, like he did underground? There was no Judgement Hall here. Hell, he didn’t even know when the reset was going to happen, he didn’t have the foresight to write that down apparently. Or maybe it was on that next page? Shit.

He felt so very, very tired.

Sans sat in the dimmed light of his living room, staring blankly at his neighbor’s sleeping body. So she was important, he had guessed. He already had this feeling, that he had known her. Hell, she had tried to get Papyrus a job, she didn’t flip the fuck out that they were monsters…

Maybe his happiness was that he had a true _friend_. Someone he could finally confide in. Someone he could let his guard down with. That person he had been seeking his entire life, so he could simply be _him._ He had friends, sure – Undyne, Alphys, Tori, Grillby… Papyrus, his own brother was the best friend he could ever ask for.

But he could never tell them. Never tell them that he watched them _die_ , over and over. Never let them know how much suffering he endured, how he had completely given up until he realized the only thing left was complete obliteration. How could they understand? It was the burden he carried alone.

What if he could finally ease his burden?

That was something worth protecting, right?

His neighbor began to stir, and he turned his face to look up at her. She opened her eyes slowly, taking in her surroundings. "hey. you feeling alright?"

"Urgh, yeah. Fuck. I'm sorry. I never drink that much. I promise I'm not a lush." She said. Sans just chuckled to himself.

"you're fine." he said, carefully flipping the washcloth around on her head. She smiled weakly at him. "small price to pay for you helping out my bro."

"Oh! Yeah, I have to thank him for helping me home too!" she said, trying to sit up. Sans pushed her back down gently.

"whoa there, tiger. he's already asleep. just rest up. you said you have work tomorrow, anyway." She groaned at this, and he gave her a gentle pat on the shoulder.

"Tomorrow is going to suck." She said dramatically, flinging an arm over her eyes. "At least it's Sunday. We close early Sundays. Thank god for Sundays." Sans chuckled a little.

"what do they say, sundays are fundays?"

"Yeah, I wish. Sundays are boring. No one comes in on Sundays." Sans was quiet for a moment. Well, seize the chance, right?

"i could stop by, if you wanted."

"Don't you work tomorrow too?"

"yeah, but i can pop in during lunch." he shrugged. "it's right down the street practically."

"That'd be awesome. Oh god, can you bring me a fruit smoothie from the cold section?" she pleaded. "I'll be in your debt forever." Sans grinned. He could do that.

"sure thing. is there a flavour you're  _bananas_  over?" he said slyly.

"Not bananas, I'll tell you that." she responded, giggling a little. "Strawberry. Or raspberry. Or something. I dunno, you picked a good stout tonight, surprise me again."

The two of them shared a smile, again. Sans felt the overwhelming flow of emotions once again coursing through him. It was like someone had shitty control over a floodgate, and it came crashing down around him randomly with no warning. He didn’t like it. But maybe… just maybe, he should try and embrace it.

 _Nah_.

She reached for her mug of tea.

"hope you don't mind chai."

"Are you kidding? I'm glad I got to  _chai_  it." she said, smirking at him. He felt himself smiling from one end to the other, absolutely delighted she cracked a bad pun.  
"i  _tea_  you like bad jokes again."

"Don't push it, bonehead."

Sans stood up, and looked at her for a moment. He paused, wondering if a part of her knew. Could he ask her? Humans were sometimes intuitive to this sort of thing, right? But that might blow it. He closed his mouth instead, deciding to stay silent.

"Thanks for letting me stay here." she said, breaching the silence.

"no problem." he said. Suddenly, he scritched the top of her head gently, in a soothing fashion, just for a second. It felt like the right thing to do. "sleep well."

She quickly passed back out, and Sans heaved a sigh.

Nothing was ever done the easy way, was it? At least she was easy on the eyes.

 _Really? Shut up._ He grumbled to himself, and went back into his bedroom after picking up his discarded journal. Damnit, he didn’t have a pillow now.

He sank into his bed best he could, bunching up the sheets to try and make a pillow, and waited for sleep to come. He had to work both shifts tomorrow, but she didn’t have to know that.

He dreamt of nothing once again.


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mistakes have been made.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> UH SO. I've never written mastubatory smut before??!??!?? so here you go it's awful have fun
> 
> warning: skeletons
> 
>  
> 
> PLEASE LOOK AT MY TUMBLR FOR LOTS OF AMAZING FANART! (beware very nsfw)
> 
> http://inthesequietmoments.tumblr.com/tagged/fanart

Sunlight was creeping in through the window, and per usual, managed to land squarely in Sans’s eyesocket. He groaned, moving to throw his pillow over his face to hide from it, when he remembered that oh yeah, he didn’t have it. He flopped around on his bed, trying to get comfortable to no avail, when he finally gave up and swung his legs over the bed. Ugh, he hated work on Sunday mornings. Hell, he hated work on _all_ mornings.

 

Although on the plus side, he was going to have a halfway decent lunch break. Assuming she remembered in the morning. Sans stood up, stretching and giving his back a small, rewarding pop, lazily threw on his Fast’n’Fresh uniform and headed into the kitchen. She still looked pretty out of it, so he left her alone. She had to be at work at some point, but if he recalled correctly, not quite this early.

 

He flipped on the coffee maker, and leaned against the counter. So last night was a bust in really finding anything out. Will is an asshole apparently, and he’s gonna cause problems, and he sent himself on a ‘choose your own adventure’ in his own goddamned journal. He literally gave himself timeframes when he can flip the page to give himself more information. _How stupid is that?_

 

But there had to be a reason, a solid one. Considering the lengths he had taken to prevent himself from ruining everything, he surmised that it was fairly important, and he’d play by the own dumb rules he set up for himself. He had set some of the dates into his phone, with alarms to go off a week in advance an whatnot so he’d touch his journal less than normal. Remove any temptation to peruse it, as it was a better choice.

 

He heard a groaning coming from the living room, and figured his guest was up. Time to go poke the tiger. He crossed over to the booze burrito, and squatted down to her level.

"morning sunshine." He said, perhaps a bit too chipper. She opened her eyes slowly, a grumpy scowl across her face.  "how you feelin'?"

"I feel like death. Tell my mother I loved her, and I want lillies at my funeral." She mumbled. Sans smirked.

"duly noted. you want some breakfast?" he asked, stretching upwards. She nodded.

"Yeah, my stomach is ready to lead a rebellion against me."

 _I find that kinda hard to digest._ She hits him with a pillow.

"i find that kinda hard to  _digest_." he said. She quickly hit him with a pillow.

  
"Sans! It's too early for that! Please!" she cried out. "Oh god, my head. Ow. I'd tell you how  _that_  feels, but I'm worried you'll make another stupid joke."

 _What, you think that’d be to my-gain?_ She grimaces, and looks utterly betrayed.

"or i'd get you some asprin."

"The risk is too great. I'll suffer in silence, a prisoner of your puns." She sighed dramatically. Sans couldn’t help but chuckle.

"i'll spare you this time. let me go get you something, and i'll make us some grub." he said. He smiled at her, then headed into the bathroom. He opened his medicine cabinet, and looked around. It was pretty empty, save for asprin for himself (he was lucky human asprin worked on him in the first place) some toothpaste, and other assorted bathroom toiletries. He grabbed a few pills, hoping it was the correct dose for a human, and filled the sink glass with some water. It wasn’t the tastiest, but it would do.

Padding back over to her, he handed her the glass and asprin, and she gladly took it with a silent thanks. She swallowed it down, and then paused for a moment. She looked up at him, her expression incredibly embarrassed.

"I didn't make a complete ass of myself last night, did I?" she asked, seemingly bracing herself for the worst. Sans laughed.

"other than exposing papyrus to the wonderful world of human regurgitation? no."

"No late night confessions? No loud karaoke?" He raised his browbone at her. Late night confessions? He was curious what he could have gotten her to confess.

"double no. you were on your best behaviour." _A shame, really._ He thought. She seemed like she would have gotten into some pretty amusing hijinx. Maybe some trouble. _No, not trouble._ Sans shifted into a smile so she wouldn’t catch on. "c'mon, lemme make you some pancakes."

"That sounds really great right now." she said, sliding out from under the covers. She grabbed the glass of water as he headed back into the kitchen, grabbing the pancake batter mix. He took the griddle out, placing it on the counter and plugged it in. _Christ, if Papyrus could see me now…_

"i wanted to say thanks again for what you did last night." Sans said from the kitchen, turning the griddle on.

"What, puking everywhere? If I knew that was what you were into..." she said, and he rolled his eyes.

"shaddap. you know what i mean. you really helped papyrus out. it means a lot to me. to us, i mean." he quickly said. He grabbed the instant pancake mix and added water, then began shaking it. She looked extremely unimpressed.

"Instant pancakes? In a bottle? Really?"

"what?" he said, grinning. "they're amazing. no cooking required."

"I guess..." she said, resting your chin on your hand. "I'm not gonna complain, free food is delicious food."

He served up the pancakes, and she took an enthusiastic bite – and one look told him everything he needed to know. He didn’t mind them, personally, but she apparently had a more ‘refined’ palate. However, she was shoving them down as fast as possible, trying to convey that they were absolutely delicious. It would have been more convincing had she not been taking gigantic gulps of orange juice to wash every bite down. Reaching across the table, her eyes locked onto his movements as he put some ketchup onto his food.

"So what's your thing with ketchup?" she asked, waving a forkful of the pancakes around.

"what do you mean, 'what's my thing'? i like it." he said, almost offended.

"You obviously have tastebuds, Sans." she grumbled, "We've talked about food before and some things you've eaten or drank, but every time I've seen you eat you ruin everything with a buttload of ketchup. What gives?"

"ruin? how dare you madam. this is for those with a refined palate." He held up the ketchup bottle. "this is a rare heinz, crafted from the finest heirloom tomatoes in the world. lovingly bottled, and then imported here so people such as yourself could get a chance to try it." He grinned. "besides, i just think it tastes good with everything. why put salt on food? same idea." He figured that was a far simpler explanation than the actual one, not everything needed to be a scientific breakdown in his life.

"Yeah, but you sprinkle salt on something, you don't assault it with it." she said casually, not realizing what came out of her mouth. Sans’s face lit up, and he grinned.

"eeeeeeeey!"

"Shut UP!" She stuffed her face with pancakes and swallowed hard. "I want TWO fruit smoothies, now." she pouted.

"don't get greedy." he said, finishing his pancakes. _Pretty good, if I do say so myself._ He stood, taking his plate and hers and went to the kitchen.

"Sans, I'll clean those up. Don't worry about it." she offered. He turned and looked at her.

"alright. i hate washing dishes anyway." he shrugged. "plus i don't wanna be late." He threw his apron on, and then put his sneakers on. He didn't bother to tie the laces - he never did.

"Have a good day at work dear!" she said as he passed her, blowing him kisses. He was caught by surprise, and missed a step, but continued walking as if nothing happened.

"see ya at lunch." He said quickly, shutting the door behind him. _Shit._ He exhaled heavily, waiting for his face to return to a normal colour. Why the hell did that fluster him so much? She was just a friend, a neighbor, a _human_. He certainly wasn’t attracted to her.

Was he?

 _No._ he thought to himself. _It’s just been for fucking ever since you’ve gotten laid, and she’s giving you attention._

It was true, though. The attention was sort of nice, even though the flirting was harmless. Shit, why not enjoy it? Sans whistled a tune through his teeth on his way to work as he thought about it. He’d never really flirted much with people, without a particular end goal. If he was flirting in a friendly manner, what was the harm? She clearly was on the same level as he was.

It would be pleasant, he figured. He liked her enough, and knew nothing would escalate too far, because let’s be real here – a skeleton and a human? _Heh. Please._ As he turned the corner, his face began to heat up a little again. Jesus Christ, why was he even entertaining the thought? _Stick with your species, Sans._

Still, how hilarious would it be to have a tryst with a human? He chuckled to himself. Thanks but no thanks. He went into his work, waving to the cashiers on his way in, and clocked in. Ross was in the back, talking to another employee.

“mornin’ ross.” Sans said, passing by him to head into the stockroom.

“Morning Sans. Hey, the guys and I were planning on going out tonight for drinks, did you wanna come?” he asked. Sans grinned.

“yeah, i’d love to! i gotta have dinner with my brother, he’s got a big day tomorrow, but i’ll be out afterwards. where you guys headed?”

“Don’t know still, probably the Niner, somewhere that has the game on. You follow sports at all?” he asked. Sans shrugged.

“not really, but it looks like a _ball_ to me.” Sans said, and Ross chuckled. “s’fine, i’ll have a good time either way.” Ross nodded at him in approval, and Sans went out into the stockroom and began his work. Looked like it would be a pretty good day today.

* * *

 

Despite the fact that when he appeared in the deli some old broad called him a ‘demon’ directly to his face, work was going fairly nicely. Ross had an extremely low tolerance for racism even from his customers, and Sans noticed the number of ‘incidents’ had been going down, if you will. Which was good, considering his construction job was quickly coming to an end.

Sans made sure to get the smoothie before he headed over to see his friend, feeling unusually peppy. He entered the store, the bell tinkling above him. She had told him that Peter wouldn’t be there, as she generally worked alone during the days.

"Heya!" she said, her voice warm. He paused, was she really that happy to see him? _You kinda did bring her a smoothie_.

"heya. brought you your fruit smoothie you demanded, your highness." He handed it to her, and she carefully took it like a precious treasure.

"Bless you. Bless your soul. You are the most wonderful person in the world right now, and may everything on this planet recognize the amazingness that is you." she said, her tone low and reverent . He shrugged, casually laughing a little.

"no biggie. did you wanna go anywhere for lunch?"

"Go? I can't leave the store. It's just me. I just eat in the back usually. But trust, I take that full half hour to the fullest." Sans frowned a little. "Don't worry, I got you. It's no cuisine, but I did think of you!" She went to the back, making a bit of noise, then came back up and displayed them on the counter. "Lunch ala _____. Maybe I'll get a Michilin star, I dunno." Two boxes of Cup of Noodles and a bottle of ketchup. She smiled lazily at him, and he couldn’t help but inwardly grin.

"wow, all this for me? you didn't have to. what a treat." he said sarcastically. She stuck her tongue out at him. It was an interesting shade of pink.

"Suck it. I'll go microwave our 5 star meal in the back. C'mon." She motioned for him to follow, and he went around the corner to the back as she asked. The ‘back’  was merely the stock room, with two metal chairs, a table with a small plastic tablecloth, and a microwave. Some posters were up talking about employee rights and hourly wage, but otherwise it wasn’t much of a break room. She picked up a bottle of water and poured it into the noodle cup, and placed it in the microwave, turning it on.

"So how's work going for you today?" she asked, idly watching the noodles spin on the roundabout.

"pretty good. only had one person call me 'hellspawn' today so far. we're starting to get down into the single digits."

"Ugh, serious? People need to get over that shit." she said, her lip curling. "It's not _fair._ " Sans had heard it from her before, she tended to get extremely heated over the topic, which he found mildly endearing. "Serious, you need to call me next time. I'll be over there in a hot minute, punching some old ladies." Sans raised a browbone at her. "What, you doubt my old lady punching skills?"

"i'm sure i can defend myself from the geriatric community, but your chivalry is appreciated." he said, smirking. The microwave beeped at them, and she took out the noodles, handing it to him with the ketchup. He suddenly snorted with a laugh as he took it.

"What?" she asked.

"you were just giving me shit this morning for putting ketchup on my pancakes."

"Yeah, and?" she said, pouring water into her noodle cup. "You made a decent point, so I grabbed some ketchup before I left my house this morning." She rolled her eyes at him.

"hey, don't get  _saucy_  with me." he quipped, putting a little ketchup into the noodles. Really, it was a pleasant taste, he wondered if he could get her to try it at some point.

"I hope you realize how much I love you to keep you around." She muttered, and he inhaled sharply at her words. He coughed the noodles out, embarrassed at how much that little sentence flustered him. "Oh jeez, slow down there, ace. You okay?"

"y-yeah. these are spicy!" he exclaimed, fanning himself. He watched as her face went from concerned to set in absolute concentration. She swiftly maneuvered behind him, wrapping her arms below his sternum.

“wuh--?” was all he managed to get out before she lifted him from behind, and he suddenly realized she was trying to perform the human first aid response to choking. She continued performing it, and he couldn’t help but burst out laughing.

"What the fuck?" she said, her voice high from both irritating and panic.

"i'm ok! i'm ok." He just kept laughing. She spun him around to look at him, her face a beet red.

"Dude! I thought you were choking! This isn't funny!" she cried out. His laughing died down as his eyes scanned her face, realizing she was actually concerned.

"no, no, i'm fine. i…” _Shit, make something up. You were blushing, you idiot._ “...was reacting to the spice. it was hot. i'm guessing my face flushed, kinda like you humans do."

"Oh god, yeah. I just heard a choking noise, and then you turned blue. Christ. So that's basically how you flush?"

"yeah. so if you turn blue, you're choking?"

"Basically." Both of them sort of nodded to each other in understanding.

"good to know. but i'll be damned if that wasn't funny."

"Heh. Yeah." she said, sounding relieved. He grinned, she wasn’t in the clear yet.

"and i'll be damned if i don't make fun of you for it for at least a week."

"Oh come ON! I just valiantly tried to save your LIFE!" she griped. She jammed her mouth full of noodles, and chewed as stubbornly as one could. "You're lucky you brought me a smoothie, I'd kick your ass out so hard right now."

"lucky me." he said, rolling his eyes. The two let out a little laugh, and ate the rest of their lunch. "so how's work for you?"

"Not bad. You're the third person to come in today." She said, sighing a little. "Thanks for the company." He smiled at her.

"no problem, anytime." He said, surprising himself. He actually meant it.

"I might take you up on that. Sundays are abysmally slow."

"i can live with that." he chortled. He looked up at the clock. "looks like my federally mandated break is over." He got up with an over-exaggerated groan. "man, i am  _bone-tired_."

 

"I don't see why, you're always  _bone-idle_  according to your brother." Sans snorted with what sounded like a cynical laugh. _If anyone actually ever knew the shit I did…_

"that's me. thanks for the lunch." He said, not wanting to break the façade.

"Oh, hey. Later tonight - book date?"

Sans paused. A date?

"W-well, not a DATE. You know what I mean." She said, stumbling over his words. _Of course not._ "Hey, screw you, you know what I mean jackass. Reading night. Book club. Whatever you wanna call it."

"book club sounds so lame. maybe if we had some of those classy shirts you sell here to wear when we read, though." He said, trying to help her out. She burst out laughing.

"Oh my god. Yes. YES. Dibs on that stupid 'Keep Calm and Drink Wine' shirt."

"i personally like the 'i improve with age' one." He said, his browbones wiggling.

"And then we can start collecting cats. Please. Can this be a thing? Can we do this? Let's be old, lame people together." The two of them laughed at this, and he started heading for the door.

"i'll be over after i get off work then. see ya later." he winked, as he usually did, and waltzed out the door. He hit the corner, when an idea struck him. Work might be boring for her, but it didn’t necessarily have to be, right? He took his phone out as he continued to walk, and texted her. 

s: knock knock

 This was stupid. There’s no way that she was going to --

**h: Who's there?**

 

His face lit up, and he tried not trip as he quickly responded.

  
s: scold  
**h: Scold who? (I hate you btw)  
** s: scold enough out here to freeze my bones off (no you don't)

This was the best idea he had had in a while.  

 **h: Will you remember me in 2 minutes?  
** s: uh, yeah  
**h: Knock knock.  
** s: that's my line  
s: who's there  
**h: Hey! You didn't remember me!**

He genuinely laughed. Had he heard that one before? Probably, but he honestly hadn’t used it. He liked that one, and made a mental note to store it away for another day. He put his phone in his pocket, and hummed a tune on his way back into work.

As he clocked back in, he suddenly remembered he had made plans with Ross that night. Shit. He went back to stocking, and kept looking around for Ross when he had a chance, inbetween his relentless knock knock jokes he was sending to his friend. Some of them were admittedly pretty bad, but she was still responding with “who’s there” – hell, she had even started a rating system. After about an hour, he finally spotted him, and did a half-jog over to him.

“hey, ross.” Sans started, and Ross looked over to him.

“Sans, what’s up?” he asked.

“yeah, so plans came up. kinda got a date tonight.” Sans said. _Well, it was half true._

“A date?” Ross asked, and his brow raised. Sans could tell he was trying to figure out if it was with a human or a monster. Sans decided not to answer it.

“yeah, totally slipped my mind. mind if i take a raincheck?” he asked, hoping Ross wouldn’t take offense. He was waiting for the overlap, but it wasn’t coming – he and Ross had never been friends like this before.

“Yeah, that’s fine. We’ll hang out another time.” Ross said with an easy smile, and Sans smiled back, waving him back to work. Sans scuttled off, and went back to his task, humming a happy tune to himself.

* * *

 

Sans felt a weird sense of excitement for going over to his friend’s house tonight, and he wasn’t quite sure why. It was just a hangout – hell, she had said so herself. But still, he was invited back over to read again, and this time he wasn’t bringing a goddamned knock knock joke book. Although admittedly, it did come in handy today. He got home later than anticipated and grabbed his book from his bookshelf then headed into the living room.

“hey paps, i’m gonna go over to our friend’s house tonight, s’ok with you?” Sans asked, remembering he hadn’t talked to Papyrus about it quite yet.

“OH THAT SOUNDS LOVELY! OF COURSE SANS, I’M GLAD YOU’RE MAKING GOOD FRIENDS! DID YOU WANT ADDITIONAL COMPANY?” Papyrus asked, his voice almost sounding hopeful. Sans inwardly cringed – he didn’t want to tell his brother no, but he also wanted to just be… well, them.

“only if you wanna, we’re just gonna read tonight. y’know, book club and all that.” he said, waving the astronomy book he had picked up earlier. Papyrus rubbed his chin in thought, then shook his head.

“NO THANK YOU, I BELIEVE I SHALL STAY BEHIND TONIGHT AND PRESS MY SUIT. I MUST LOOK APPROPRIATE FOR TOMORROW, AS BEING PREPARED WILL ENSURE I SECURE EMPLOYMENT!” Papyrus said, looking pleased with himself. Sans smiled at his brother.

“alright. i got my phone on me if you need me.”

“SANS, YOU SHALL BE MERE STEPS AWAY. I SHALL BE FINE.” Papyrus said, and chuckled a little. Sans waved to him and grabbed his hoodie – they’d likely be sitting on the porch – and headed over to his friend’s house.

He rang the doorbell and waited, rocking on his feet slightly. No answer. She should have been off of work by this point, so he rang the doorbell again. Once more, no answer. He frowned, did she forget? Carefully, he pressed his skull up against the door and listened for a moment. Did he hear running water?

 _Well, she’s home at least._ He thought. He took his phone out and sent her a text.

s: knock knock

 

She didn’t answer, and he sighed. He leaned against the railing outside the doorway, and wondered to himself why he was so antsy about this? Probably because she said it was a date earlier, even though both of them knew it wasn’t.

_Jesus Christ Sans,_ he thought, _How many times are you going to think about that? You’re hanging out with your friend. Hanging out. With. Your friend. You are reading books._

A few minutes passed, and he was counting the amount of cracks in the stairwell wall when his phone buzzed.

  
**h: Who's there? (this is never going to get old)  
** s: dozen  
**h: Dozen who?**  
s: dozen anybody wanna let me in?

 Maybe she’d realize he was waiting outside with that one. Or at least confirm someone else was in the apartment. She swung the door open, her hair dripping wet. He shoved his hands in his pockets, tucking his book under one arm.

"wondering when you were gonna open up." he said.

"I'm sorry! I was in the shower!" she said, gesturing to her hair. He couldn’t help but take her in visually as she said that, then immediately shook the notion from his head.

"no big deal." he said, coughing a little. "i wasn't out here long." She stepped aside to let him into the house.

"Please tell me you didn't get another knock knock joke book. I don't think you need to actually know more." Sans laughed at this, heading for the patio.

"nah, not this time. had an old astronomy book i've been lugging around, wanted to take a look at it."

"Oh yeah?" she said. "Like, star positions and stuff?"

"kinda. planets, star systems, yadda yadda. boring stuff." He said, sure she wouldn’t be interested. Not many humans were particularly fascinated by the stuff unless it was their chosen field, so he learned to keep quiet about it.

"Not that boring. You can't see the stars here very well, though." she said, frowning. She handed him a mug, sitting in her usual comfy chair, watching as he settled into the one opposite her. "Sucks. I grew up somewhere where you could see the stars all the time." Sans sucked in a sigh between his teeth.

"must've been nice. didn't have stars underground, obviously." he said, trying to control the timbre of his voice. Why was he telling her this? "probably why i like them so much. it's amazing to imagine there's so much out there, above you. infinite possibilities, a vastness, swirling and changing... all of it on display to see on a regular basis." His head tilted back, and he looked up at the ceiling of the porch with it’s tiny lights, twinkling like the same falseness of the underground’s own stars. She remained silent, but he could tell she was listening , so for some reason, he continued. "i remember seeing the night sky for the first time, and just being absolutely amazed." he said, laughing bitterly, "and then i saw it again. and again. and sometimes i wonder..."

_I wonder why I ever gave a damn._

He snapped out of his reflective mood and looked at her, just staring at him.

"sorry, i'm just rambling. don't mind me. don't you have some reading about a vampire prince or somethin'?" he said awkwardly, rubbing the back of his neck.

"Vampire KING, actually - but you can talk, you know." she said, her voice gentle. He smiled despite himself, he could tell she meant it. But she definitely didn’t want to hear this.

 "nah. i'm good. maybe another time. i'm really in the mood to read, y'know? you got me all hyped up at lunch."

"Alright..." she said, unsure. "...if you ever need an ear though..." she gave him a sweet smile, and left it at that. He smiled back at her, and they both sank into their chairs, getting comfortable. Opening their books, they passed their time in silence, and in each other’s company.

A few hours passed, when Sans suddenly heard a strange noise coming from her. At first he thought it was just someone walking their pet, but then it happened again. What was that?

"are you making that noise?" he asked, curious.

"What noise?"

"that weird gurgling noise." She laughed.

"Yeah. That's my stomach. I'm hungry." She said simply.

"you think monsters are weird?" he remarked, remembering some of her comments.

"I'll have you know that the human gastrointestinal system is very complex and intricate!" she complained. Her made that odd noise again. "You wanna order some pizza?" Sans couldn’t have been more thrilled at the suggestion, he smiled in what felt like relief at the idea.

"yeah. that'd be great. i told papyrus i'd be here tonight, so he's fine on his own."

"Ahh, modern marvels. Once upon a time, I'd have to get up to do this - now I can do it all while being a lazy ass and never moving." She said, pressing a button her phone and placing an order for a pizza over the phone.

"a girl after my own heart." said Sans. She snickered.

"Sans, you'd fall in love with a sea slug." She said. Hey, that wasn’t fair.

"nah, they're too _salty_  about life."

"OH MY--" she jumped to her feet suddenly, surprising him. "IN MY OWN HOME NO LESS." she crossed over to him and grabbed the pillow behind him, and hit him with it. He feigned hurt at the gentle boff.

"you wound me! and here i am, a guest under your roof. when the duchy learns, there will be war. monsters everywhere will riot." He said, putting a hand to his head as if he were a southern belle.

"Well, I guess then they'll be  _sans a skeleton_." She shot at him, pushing the pillow down into him, shoving her weight into it as she giggled. His grin was ridiculous at this point, he couldn’t stop himself from what he was about to do - he yanked the pillow out from her grip, causing her to fall onto him, and the two of them became a tangle of laughter. He lightly boffed her in the face with the pillow and left it there.

"Smother me if you must, cruel monster, but I shall not allow the world to suffer your awful punnery. I perish for speaking truths, and only truths." She dramatically flopped her arms like a dead fish. He chuckled as the two of them laid there, her with the pillow still over her face. He looked at her, chuckling, when her stomach made the noise again. Her shirt had slightly lifted, exposing her smooth stomach, and he couldn’t help but reach his hand out to feel it – did the stomach cause the entire body to rumble, or just the localized area? He placed his head down to it to see if he could hear anything in particular, perhaps gastrointestinal spasming? She jolted up, seeing him with his head to her stomach, looking positively amused.

"Rude!" she said, whacking him.

"it's making that noise again." he indicated. "sorry. i just..." he backed away, looking embarassed. _Shit. You crossed a line. Fuck._

She laughed.

"It's fine. You're lucky you're a skeleton, or I'd have to call the cops on you or something." she said, with a lop-sided smile. "Since you're invading my personal space, can I invade yours?"

 _Wait, what? Invade my personal space? What does she think she’s going to find?_  "what? w... what do you mean?"

"Oh jesus, I'm not asking you to take off your pants." She scoffed. "I just wanna see what's making you so... how do I put this..." she gestured with her hands in front of her like he had a basketball for a stomach.

"fat?" he asked, trying not to feel offended.

"No! Full? You just fill out your shirt, and you're  _obviously_  a skeleton." She frowned for a second. "Hey man, if I'm getting too personal here, feel free to slap me with the shut-up pillow."

"is that what we're calling it now? i like it. nah, you're fine. here, look." he said, and he lifted up the green polo shirt he was wearing. Good god, was he really doing this? Had he ever done this for anyone? _No, the answer is no._ He’d show off his arm maybe, sometimes his legs when he wore shorts, but he’d never just… lifted his shirt before. What the hell was he doing?  Her eyes widened, and her mouth went mildly slack. "Whoa." was all she said. Sans' brow furrowed.

"spooky, right?" he said. _Yeah, cement how extremely different you are. It’s bad enough she can see you’re a walking skeleton poking out of human clothing, now it’s just more obvious._

"No! It's awesome!" she enthused. "I mean, how do you... it looks like you have mass under here when you put the..." she grabbed his shirt, and pulled it back down. She continued doing this a few times, as if expecting something different to happen when she lifted it, and was clearly fascinated by the fact that he had a form. "This is so cool!"

"heh. i'm glad you're entertained by my weirdness."

"It's so fascinating, you're basically... I mean, I know you're a skeleton Sans. But you're not. You're you. You're unique. Does that make sense?" she asked. Sans couldn’t help but feel his cheeks begin to slowly heat, no one had really reacted to him like this before, much less a human. While not exactly telling him he was handsome, it was still a tad bit flattering, and it caught him off guard. Without warning, she suddenly reached out and gently wrapped her delicate fingers around one of his lower ribs, rubbing to feel the texture. Sans felt a shock of pleasure shoot through his spine, and stifled a surprised moan at her soft touch. _Oh, yes. Please._

_No!_

He grabbed the Shut-Up pillow and smacked her in the face so hard that she fell backwards.

"shit! sorry. sorry! that's just.. it's..." Sans couldn’t stop the blush from spreading across his face. God damnit! He suddenly felt a long forgotten, but familiar twitch in his pants. _God damnit, no. NO._ She slapped a hand over her mouth.

"Oh god, I'm so sorry! Did I hurt you? Fuck! I'm such an asshole. I'm sorry Sans. Fuck. Here." she rolled up her sleeve and gestured to her arm. "You can hit me. Or something. I dunno. Shit." _Oh thank god, she didn’t notice. She thinks she hurt me. Roll with it. Fucking roll with it._ Sans laughed awkwardly, his face fading back to his normal colour.

"no, no. it's fine. it didn't hurt at all. it's just... really sensitive." He said. _Sensitive doesn’t even begin to describe it._

They both sat there in an awkward silence, when suddenly Sans started chuckling. She started to chuckle a little with him, and that cascaded into full blown laughter from the both of them. The whole thing was absolutely absurd.

"So, skeletons are ticklish. Good to know." she said, finally calming down from the laughter. Sans paused. Good lord, if she had any clue at what she had just done… should he tell her? He didn’t want her repeating that, or doing to Papyrus by accident. Then again, she was now under the impression that it was a horrible idea, so perhaps he was in the clear.

"yeah, something like that." he said, giving her a sidelong glance. He couldn’t look her in the eye. "i really don't recommend it." he added.

"Noted." She said. "Look at us, breaking down those human / monster barriers, ushering in an age of peace and understanding."

"more like stupidity, if you ask me." Sans snorted.

"No one asked you, jackass."

"everyone loves to listen to me, i tell great jokes." He said smugly. She pinched his arm best she could, and he chuckled.

"Shaddap." Her stomach made the noise again. "Where the fuck is the pizza?" she whined.

"my turn." Sans said unceremoniously, and flopped her onto her back. He flipped her shirt up over her head just like she had done to him, and immediately was flooded with both a feeling of reward and regret. Everything was so… pink, and soft looking. And even though they really shouldn’t, the tops of her breasts spilling from her bra were… _appealing._

He didn’t have time to react before she pelted him in the head with the Shut-Up Pillow.

"DUDE. Ok. No." she said, immediately fixing her shirt.

"what?" he asked, rubbing his face. Humans were confusing.

"Crash course lesson, friend. These..." she said, gesturing to her breasts, "..are no-no spots. It's my good ol' private area, just for me."

"i thought it was for reproduction purposes?" Sans asked, tilting his head. He knew that it was frowned upon to have exposed breasts in public for humans, and didn’t understand considering they were tools used for feeding young. But then again, after seeing them presented like that, almost like a weird present waiting for be unwrapped?

_What. The fuck. Are you thinking._

"Well, yeah. But in human society, it's taboo for someone to see them unless you're... look, just stay away from my fucking tits, ok?" she chuckled. "Stomach's cool though. Go nuts." She lifted her shirt for him, but only a little – she was keeping this scientific, and he heaved a sigh of relief. He could handle _this_.

Instantly, he was poking and prodding her, his fingers trying to figure her out.  Her skin was so soft and smooth, gentle against his hands. While he was trying to keep it as scientific as possible, he was unabashedly savouring the feel of her against his bare bones, lingering in some spots that felt a little softer than others, or less springy even. Her stomach made the odd noise again, and he pressed the flat of his palm to it, excited.

"I forget the reason why it does that. It's super annoying." She offered.

"seems it." he said, pulling away. "it's like an angry little dog, begging for scraps."

"That's an... interesting way of putting it." she said, looking at her stomach. She pinched it, taking the flesh between her fingers roughly. "Heh, I'm getting a little tubby, it's all that wine."

"i think you look amazing." Sans said quietly. She looked up at him, her mouth slightly open as if she were speechless. _Shit. Too forward._ "you know, for a human." he quickly added.

"Well, you don't look half bad for a bag of bones. So there you go." she giggled. The two of them smiled at each other, in that way that they were starting to. Then the doorbell rang.  "Oh thank god, food time!"

"you have no idea how excited i am for pizza." Sans said, wondering if his own stomach would growl at the thought of pizza.

She paid for the pizza, almost kicking the delivery boy off her doorstep and plopped down next to him on the couch inside, placing the pizza on the tabletop. "So are you super hungry or what?"

"i'm just... it's a change of pace." he said, not adding anything to it.

"Sans..." she began slowly.

"yeah?"

"Does... Papyrus only cook pasta?"

Sans looked at his pizza, and sighed. And then took a really big bite out of it, savouring it.

"yeah."

"It's amazing pasta!" she said, trying to console him. "But... let's.. I'll see if I can expand his cooking retinue. Or at least have you over for dinner more often." She added. He couldn’t help but smile at this, she really was a sweetheart.

"that'd be great." he said. She gave him a lop-sided smile.

"What're friends for?" she said.

"what're friends for." he echoed. _Friends._

The two of them polished off the pizza pretty easily, and then went back to reading for a few more hours. Despite their earlier ‘scientific inquiries’, Sans couldn’t help but steal glances at her every now and again. He noticed how nicely she curled up in her chair, and how nice her curves seemed to be. She idly twirled her hair, and he noticed her biting her lip every now and again when she got to what he figured was a good part of the book. Did she always do that? Why was he just noticing this now? He tried to ensconce himself in his book, but his mind kept drifting to how delightfully soft and pink she was…

_STOP IT._

This wasn’t normal, this wasn’t right. _Jesus Sans, she touches you and you’re a horny teenager all over again. Knock it the fuck off,_ he thought to himself. But what’s to say it wasn’t right? There was so much diversity in monsters, it would almost be like –

 _No, nope. No, no. No._ _Calculations suggest that physical_ _information_ _could permanently disappear in a_ _black hole_ _, allowing many physical states to devolve into the same state. Woo, interesting stuff there, book!_

He physically raised his book higher, so he wouldn’t be tempted to look at her for the rest of the evening. She didn’t seem to notice thankfully, and he was able to finish the evening in some modicum of peace.

They called it a night after a bit longer. She gave Sans a hug before he left, and this time, he eased into it. _Just allow it,_ he thought. He waved goodnight to her, and went back into his apartment, leaning against his door as he shut it, his head in his hands. He looked around – had Papyrus already gone to bed? Ah yeah, shit, he had his interview in the morning.

Sans padded into his room, tired. All in all, it was a surprisingly good day. He collapsed backwards onto his bed, staring at the ceiling. Paps had an interview, he had a pretty easy time at work, hell, Ross had even invited him out for the evening. But shit, he wouldn’t have traded all the drinks in a shitty dive bar for what happened tonight.

His mind began to wander a little, despite his weak protestations. She _was_ delightfully soft, that was for certain. His hands had their fill that evening of her gentle curves of her stomach and sides – but good god, did he want _more._ Was all of her that soft? Probably. _Jesus, I would kill to find out right now._

Idly, he lifted his shirt and thumbed at his ribs a little, tracing over where she had touched him. He let out a low rumble, his own ministrations not giving the same pleasurable feel, but the memory was serving him well. All he had wanted was for her to keep going, to keep touching – but then he’d have to explain why an erect skeleton was standing on her porch panting like a bitch in heat. He once again felt that familiar twitch in his pants and he groaned. This wasn’t right, he shouldn’t be thinking about her this way.

_But why not? What’s it going to hurt?_

In all honesty, it’s not like she was going to find out, right? And it’s not like he was going to actively pursue her. So what was the harm in having a bit of imaginary fun?

He heaved a heavy sigh, unceremoniously shoving his pants down. Good god, how long had it been since he had even done this? His memories of his last lay had long since faded, not that it was particularly memorable to begin with. _Ugh, stop cluttering your mind. Just think about her._

Once again his mind went back to the fresh memory of her skin, rosy and supple, rising and falling against the touch of his hand. Oh Christ, how he had wanted to explore beyond her middle, especially after seeing what was up above. Her breasts, surprisingly tantalizing were just _begging_ to be touched as well now. He could imagine himself inching his hand upwards, removing them from their lacy wrapping.

His actual hand lowered to his cock, already standing at attention. He slowly wrapped his fingers around it, and gave it an experimental stroke. His legs tensed at the sensation, and he couldn’t help but let out a guttural moan. Fuck, she was a goddamned enigma right now, and all he wanted to do was _solve_ it. He didn’t even have the slightest how humans had sex – he knew they did – but he wanted to know. He wanted to figure it out, he wanted to be able to provide her with whatever it was she wanted right now. He twisted his hand at the shaft, stroking upwards and dragging his finger down the tip. He didn’t care if it involved ritual sacrifice, as long as it involved him touching her, tasting her, _fucking her._

That last thought caused him to begin pumping his cock vigorously. Shit, were they compatible? Fuck it, they were in his mind right now. Everything was between the legs, it was the only part of her he hadn’t seen yet, he was sure of it. _Focus on what you do know, right?_ The details were fuzzy, but all he knew was he had a desperate need for her to ride his cock, to see her bite her lip the way she did on the patio, her hair spilling over her shoulders and into his face, nails gripping into his bones… _Fuck._

He let out a gasp, his hand tightening to almost painful levels as he worked himself with a fury. Oh yes, he’d fuck her. He’d fuck her again, and again, and his name would be falling from his lips through cries and noises he wasn’t even sure she’d be able to make, but right now, in this moment, she was fucking making them for him. He felt the sweat beading on his skull from the exertion, and he knew that it wouldn’t be much longer. Christ, all he wanted was for her to say his name, her pouty lips forming it and saying it like both a prayer and a curse as he came.

He grunted as his body wracked with pleasure, his leg kicking slightly as he shot his load onto himself. He panted, more tired than before, observing the idiotic mess he had just made. He laid there in the darkness of the room, catching his breath for a moment or two, his mind racing.

He slapped his other hand over his face.

_I just jerked it to my neighbor._

_God fucking damnit._

Sleep couldn’t come fast enough.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> plz be kind and rewind
> 
> Writing wank sessions is hard man, especially when he has no idea how the fuck humans work fffff
> 
> Feedback is always wanted and loved


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> UH HI HELLO I FINALLY UPDATED  
> ITQM IS IN THE WORKS DON'T WORRY
> 
> You might see another ITDM before ITQM because it's just easier to finish. I <3 you guys, thanks for putting up with the radio silence.
> 
> If you're ever curious about what's going on, check out my tumblr: http://inthesequietmoments.tumblr.com/

Normally, sleep would be an escape, it would be a few hours of nothing. A void, if you will. But for whatever reason, there were whispers, a female voice that carried through his strange emptiness inside his head - and he in turn decided to follow it. He woke up right before he found the source, and groaned as the light was shining directly into his socket.

His bones felt an unsettling ache as he slowly lifted himself off the bed, propping himself backwards onto his elbows. Squinting, he surveyed his room; nope, still the same. Good lord, did he really wank it last night to his poor neighbor? He looked down at himself, and while the evidence was long gone, he could still see the aether remnants lingering on his shirt.

 _Jeez, this is a new low, even for you_. he thought. Sure, he'd pleasured himself thinking of people down from the Underground on a few occasions, but that was much, much simpler. There wasn't as much confusion, as the species varied so wildly down there that there was generally a huge explanation beforehand. Humans, assumedly, were just one way - and he was pretty sure he wasn't really compatible with whatever it was.  
But did it hurt to think about it? He felt an unwanted twitch in his pants as the answer to that was apparently a resounding 'no'. He sighed heavily, desperately willing himself to get that shit under control ASAP. He rubbed at his skull, his hand dragging down over his tired eyesockets.

Well, fuck. This changed things, a little. He never properly had much of a crush on anyone - he never had the time. Or the desire, really. Sure, he probably did in previous iterations, but not for a long, long while. He grumbled to himself, swinging his legs over the bed and leaned into his thighbones. It's not like she knew, so it'd be easy to conceal, right? Not to mention, he'd probably get over it fast.

 _Exactly,_ he said to himself. Besides, she was probably going to be the World Saviour or some such bullshit, since his journal was being so obnoxiously mysterious about her. It's best not to be fantasizing about the hero, that's a bit creepy.  
He looked at the clock, and then to his phone which he forgot to charge the previous night. It was blinking - did he have a text message? He snatched it up, half-hoping it was from her.

 

**h: Hey, just wanted to let you know Papyrus got to the interview and stuff. Will text when I know what's up.**

 

Wait, why hadn't he gone with Papyrus? He looked again at the clock, and his loose jaw clamped shut. _Fuck!_ He was late for work! Hell, he was _beyond_ late for work! He immediately dialed into work, getting a rather grumpy sounding Barbara.

"Thanks for calling Fast'n'Fresh, this is Bar--"

"barbara. hey, it's me. sans. hey, is ross there?" he asked, not sure how to sound sick to a human.

"Oh. Sans. Yeah, playing hooky today? I'll get him on the line." she said slowly, then the line went dead - and a minute later, Ross picked up.

"Sans." he said, and Sans had a moment of panic. Where was his overlap?

"hey." he said, weakly as possible. Suddenly, he felt the shift. There it was, thank god!

 _Tell him you caught a cold._ He sounds disbelieving. He reprimands him.

 _Tell him you're sick with a monster thing._ Ross immediately drops it, and asks when Sans'll be in next.

"shit, i'm sorry ross. i got basically... i dunno how to explain it, but sick with a monster illness." Sans said, feeling slightly bad about lying.

"A monster thing?" Ross asked, sounding concerned. "Well, feel better. Next time, call ahead would you? I had to stock shelves until Tim showed up."

"yeah, yeah. of course, i wasn't expecting to feel so awful." Sans said, and Ross exhaled.

"When should I expect you back in?" Ross asked.

"next shift, for sure. again, sorry. i should be better by then." he said, and he could almost hear Ross nodding on the other side of the phone.

"No problem. Get better bud. I'll see you then." he said, and then hung up. Sans let out a sigh of relief. Thank god, he liked that job ever since he realized what a good guy Ross was, and some of his coworkers were. As he went to plug his phone in, it buzzed in his hand. It was her.

 

**h: Also, Jackie wanted me to invite you guys out for Thai food tonight. Feel free to say no if you're sick of me. ;P**

 

He started thumbing in an answer, but decided to wait so it didn't look to desperate. He was supposed to be at work, right? Sans waited what felt like an agonizing five minutes before he responded.

 

s: great. thanks so much  
s: not familiar with thai food, but i'll try anything once. not sick of you yet, but i'll keep you updated  
**h: Gee, thanks.**  
s: i aim to please

 

Thai food? What was that? He stood up, taking his phone and charger with him and went into the living room. He had left his tablet out there, and plugged his phone in next to him and turned on the tablet.  
'what is thai food' he typed into the search bar. The first thing that popped up was stupidly unhelpful, just saying 'food that is uniquely Thai' and 'it depends on who cooked it and where they cooked it'. Well jeez, that was helpful. He scrolled down until he found an article that explained it a little better. So spicy foods, lots of sauces, rices, meats... he shrugged. He wasn't a picky eater by any stretch of the imagination, and it would give him a break from spaghetti. He idly wondered if they served ketchup at the restaurant when his phone vibrated again. He grabbed it, and was greeted with a pleasant message.

 

**h: Your brother got the job!! :D :D**

 

Holy shit. He really got the job? Sans paused, and looked upwards, letting out a huge sigh of relief. If Papyrus was working, he wouldn't have to work that second job anymore. His contract had run out, and was beginning to panic as Fast'n'Fresh wasn't granting him quite enough hours to cut it to fund the apartment on that alone. Sure, he had managed their finances well enough since receiving the stipend from the human government, but that money seemed to evaporate just by merely living on the surface. They only got aid for one more year, from what he understood. He had been doing the best he possibly could to make it stretch, and given they were still living with their original furniture (courtesy his teleportation - no one had to know) he had been ridiculously frugal.

He didn't know what to text back, so he left it blank. He was sure he'd hear from Papyrus soon, and they'd head out to dinner.

She was pretty amazing, really. And still, so very soft...

Sans looked down, realizing his idle hand had been moving slowly towards his dick when he put the tablet down. What was his deal? It had to be the just the length of time it had been for him. Hell, he probably could redeclare himself virginal at this point, and be thrown into a volcano. He chuckled, leaning back in his chair.

Well, but what about his thoughts?

What were humans like? Beyond all the basical structual anatomy?

Sans looked at the clock, and to his tablet. He technically had time to find out.

But fuck, that might make it _worse_. He drummed his fingers on the table in thought, and stood up, taking the tablet back into the bedroom with him. It was research that, or thai food, and the prior sounded far more interesting.

Sans laid back in bed, propping his pillow up behind him to make himself comfortable. _Alright google, do your worst_.

'human female anatomy' he plopped into the search bar, and immediately it populated. Pictures of skinless humans flooded his image search, scientific articles explaining how the inner workings of a female worked. Now this he could handle. Sure, it wasn't sexy, but it certainly was fascinating. Slowly, he began memorizing the various muscle groups and internal organs, then wondered if males differed much from females in respects to organs as well. He changed his search to 'male', and took a gander.

Pretty much the same stuff, except the obvious difference of a noticeable lack of breasts and --

 _Well wait a tic_. he thought to himself. Humans had dicks too? That was... good. Sure, he had heard the term used, but in a negative manner mostly. So if that was the case...

He immediately went back to the female anatomy page, and tapped his fingers gingerly against the keyboard.

'human female reproduction' he typed in, and hit enter. Well. That answers that.

For the most part, they seemed pretty damned compatible. Sans was always struggling with that Underground - not everyone had the same 'system' if you will. From what he was reading, his bits could easily fit into her bits and...

"SANS!" he heard from the living room. _Shit_! Sans immediately turned his tablet off, stuffing it in his nightstand drawer. Oh god damnit, he had an erection again? It was like being a teenager all over again. He groaned, stuffing his half-erect cock into the waistband of his pants, pulling his baggy shirt over it best he could.

"yeah bro?" he said, peeking out his his room. Papyrus practically slammed the door into him, bursting into his room.

"I DID IT! I GOT THE JOB!" he said, pulling Sans into a crushing hug. Sans laughed a little, his awkwardness fading.

"hell yeah! when do you start?" he asked. Papyrus thought for a second.

"I DO NOT REMEMBER! BUT I NEED TO BRING MY MONSTER IDENTIFICATION CARD TO DINNER TONIGHT! YOU _ARE_ COMING TO DINNER, YES?" he asked, but Sans knew it wasn't really a question.

"of course. how could i not celebrate? this is great." he said, genuinely smiling. Papyrus beamed at his smaller brother, bursting with pride.

"AND THEN I SHALL BE ABLE TO CONTRIBUTE PROPERLY! SO REST UP, AND THEN LET US PREPARE FOR OUR DATE WITH EVERYONE!"

"it's not a date paps, it's just a dinner." Sans said, chuckling. Papyrus rolled his eyes.

"WE WON'T KNOW UNTIL WE GET THERE, I MIGHT HAVE POSSIBLY WOOED THE LADIES." Papyrus said, and nudged his brother a few times. "I CANNOT HELP BEING SO IRRESTIABLY SUAVE."

"of course." Sans said, giving his brother a half-hug. "proud of you, still. i'm gonna nap until dinner, alright?"

"REALLY? YOU LOOK LIKE YOU JUST WOKE UP FROM SLEEP. DID YOU NOT WORK TODAY?" Papyrus asked.

"short shift." Sans said, shrugging.

"AH, CURSES! NORMALLY I'D STATE THAT'S HOW THEY PREVENT YOU FROM GETTING YOUR WELL-EARNED BENEFITS, BUT WE'RE NOT ELIGIBLE FOR THOSE STILL."

"still makes good conversation filler." Sans said, smirking. Papyrus nodded in agreement.

"INDEED! WELL, SLEEP WELL BROTHER, AND I SHALL SEE YOU THIS EVENING." he said, and turned to leave, pausing in the doorway. "AND FOR THE LOVE OF ALL THAT IS GOOD, PLEASE CHANGE YOUR SHIRT."

 _God damnit_! What an idiot, it's not like Papyrus wouldn't notice! Sans turned a bright shade of blue and practically slammed the door on him. He could hear Papyrus chuckling smugly on the other side of the door, and he slapped a hand over his face. Good lord, what was wrong with him?

He crawled into bed - sleeping it off would be a better choice. He eyed his dresser drawer, craving to know more; _No, that'll just lead to problems_.

He closed his eyes, despite having just woken up, knowing he'd be able to fall back asleep without much issue. As he tried to drift off, he kept thinking one thing.

 _We're compatible_.

 

* * *

  
Sans and Papyrus had gotten directions from Will, who had texted Papyrus the address of the restaurant. They were able to hail a cab without too much issue, both of them drawing up their hoods on their jackets as to not draw attention to themselves. The cabbie gawked for a moment, but thankfully didn't say much after that. Papyrus and Sans chattered quietly between themselves, although it was mostly Papyrus chatting about how he thought these exotic noodles would taste.  
As they entered the restaurant, Sans immediately scanned the room. He couldn't miss Jackie, who was waving her hand wildly in the air to grab their attention, and he chuckled inwardly. He tugged on Papyrus's sleeve, who looked down at his brother, and then to Jackie.

"AH, YES! THE SMALLER HUMAN! I DO LIKE HER." he said, and the two crossed over to the booth.

"Hey guys!" Jackie said cheerfully. "_____ is on the way, she just got off work. How was your day?"

"QUITE WONDERFUL, THANK YOU!" Papyrus said, his toothy grin popping back up as always. "I AM SURE YOU ARE AWARE OF THE POTENTIAL FESTIVITIES OF THIS EVENING." Jackie giggled a bit.

"Yeah, congratulations! I'm glad that worked out so well! _____ is ridiculously good at helping people out." she said, and Sans scooted into the booth.

"she's definitely resourceful." he said, and Jackie stared at him for a moment.

"Definitely. She mentioned you guys have a book club starting?" she said, and Sans tried to keep his face under control - he could feel heat spreading into his face.

"yeah, she reads shitty vampire novels while i make fun of them one a week. it's great, you should give it a try." he said with an easy grin. Shit, he didn't really want anyone else joining them.

"I'd rather watch TV, I won't lie." Jackie said, smirking.

"I RATHER LIKE TELEVISION AS WELL!" Papyrus said enthusiastically. "AND THANKS TO OUR WONDERFUL MUTUAL FRIEND, WE CAN NOW AFFORD TO GET THE CHANNELS THAT GO BEYOND FIFTEEN!" Jackie blinked a few times, but didn't say anything.

"so, thai food? we've never had it before." Sans said, and Jackie grinned.

"Oh man, Thai food is probably me and bestie's favourite food. Drunk? Noodles. Plain hungry? Curry. Sad? Soup. It's like an entire menu of comfort." she said, chuckling a little, clearly remembering a few things.

Papyrus was about to say something when he spotted his neighbor come in the door and cross over to them.

"Hey guys!" she said, plopping down next to Jackie, giving her a side hug. Sans half-waved, desperately trying to forget the previous night's activities. Papyrus immediately stood up and went to her side, picking her up in another one of his patented hugs.

"HELLO BEST FRIEND! I WAS SPEAKING HERE WITH YOUR BESTEST FRIEND AND TELLING HER ABOUT HOW WONDERFUL YOU ARE, AND HOW EMPLOYED I AM!" he said to her excitedly.

"Yeah! That was pretty cool of Will." Jackie said, but her tone betrayed her words. Sans's browbone raised, catching it, and they exchanged a brief look. Papyrus put his friend back down, and sat once again looking rather chuffed. She smoothed out her clothes, and sat back down.

"It really was. But realistically," she said, motioning to Papyrus, "Will didn't do much. Papyrus has the talent, Will just had the job open." Papyrus beamed at this, clearly proud of himself. Sans was smiling at his brother's talents, but inwardly was dreading seeing Will again.

"AND THANKS TO YOU, HE REALIZED MY IMMENSE TALENTS IN THE REALM OF COOKING!" Papyrus exclaimed. Sans flicked his eyes to his friend, as she finally looked at him.

"thanks." was all he could manage to get out. She smiled at him and gave a little shrug.

"So did Jackie give you the rundown of the menu?" she asked. Sans and Papyrus nodded.

"THERE IS SO MUCH PASTA ON THIS MENU!"

"It's spicy though!" she said. "I remember you don't do spicy well." she said, looking pointedly at Sans. _Shit, she remembered that_. Well, time to not eat half the stuff on the menu.

"SANS EATS SPICY FOOD ALL THE--" Papyrus started, and Sans kicked the everloving shit out of Papyrus's shin to hopefully shut him up. "OW! SANS, WHY ARE YOU DOING THAT?" Papyrus said, looking down at his legs. Sans put on the most convincing smile he possibly could.

"nah papyrus, you're thinking of someone else." he said, his head slowly turning towards Papyrus, the lights in his eyes slowly dimming. Papyrus got the hint, and snapped his jaw shut.

"OH YES, SOMEONE ELSE. MY BAD. IT WAS... THE OTHER... SKELETON... THAT I ONCE KNEW." he replied, a little less than convincing. Sans's head sunk down into his hands. _I don't need this tonight_. Jackie coughed, then turned to face _____, hoping to change the subject.

"So! What's new? Anything exciting?" Jackie inquired.

"Same ol', same ol'. You know me." she said.

"SHE ALMOST ASSAULTED A MAN IN MY DEFENSE TODAY!" Papyrus chimed in. What!? Sans's head shot up to look at her.

"Whoa, whoa. You make it sound like a big deal, Papyrus." she said, waving her hands in defense, her eyes nervously darting to Sans. "Some asshole was just being rude, so I called him a few names."

"IF I RECALL, YOU THREATENED TO TIE UP HIS NETHER REGIONS WITH THE RIDICULOUS APPARATUS ON TOP OF HIS CAR." Papyrus added. Sans could see her inwardly groaning.

"That too." she muttered. Jackie just laughed.

"Yeah, that sounds like you." Jackie said, massaging her shoulders suddenly. "Wish I had seen it! Although I probably would have been shouting too."

"Probably. Hell, we could've tag teamed him. El Tigre and La Diabolica, pile driving his car into the ring." she laughed. Sans smirked for a moment, thinking of Undyne - but then realized the implication of what they were talking about.

"he didn't try to hurt you guys, right?" Sans said, trying to keep his voice at an even keen.

"No, of course not. He was just rude." she said. Her brow raised. "You know, like old ladies and hellspawn rude." Sans heaved a sigh of relief at that. So basically harmless, is what she was trying to say.

"ah, gotcha. well, screw that guy." he said, leaning back into the booth. "he prolly woulda got you guys lost anyway."

"PROBABLY!" Papyrus said, thinking on it. "PLUS THE WALK WAS VERY NICE THIS MORNING!"

"Anyway, work was meh, Peter wouldn't shut up all goddamned day, yadda yadda. And you heard about Papyrus straight from the source." she said with a smile. Papyrus nodded happily, as did Jackie. "So, what about you?"

"We-ell, you know that job promotion I've been whining about?" she asked.

"Of course."

"Nailed it." she responded.

"Oh HELL yes." she said, with a fist pump. _Man, she's cute_. Sans thought to himself, then immediately grimaced. He needed to stop that. "So what the hell was with your text earlier?" Jackie looked at her, her lips pursed and she crossed her arms.

"Girl, you know why. Don't even start." She waved her off dismissively. What text? They were being extremely vague, but Sans knew it wasn't a good moment to pry. Papyrus looked extremely intrigued by whatever the gossip was, and was nodding his head enthusiastically in an attempt to be a part of it.

"Whatever. Are we gonna wait for Will before we order or what?"

"Nah, we don't have to." said Jackie, almost immediately. Sans raised a browbone. She really didn't like this guy, and she wasn't being particularly low key about it. Maybe he'd have to talk to her about him later, if she'd be willing to.

"I WOULD LIKE TO, SINCE HE IS THE REASON OF MY GOOD DAY. PLUS I HAVE MY CARD WITH ME!" Papyrus said, smiling. Jackie sighed a little.

"Let's at least order drinks, then." Everyone at least agreed on that. Everyone placed their order and then chatted amongst themselves as they waited for Will. Sans could feel his leg jittering under the table, the waiting was killing him. Was he gonna get bad vibes again tonight?

He showed up about 10 minutes later, smashing himself in next to Sans's friend with no warning. "Hey!" he exclaimed, giving her a big side hug. Sans felt like he was dripping with oil as he touched her, and internally recoiled. "Hey h- _____! Jackie, Sand, Papyrus!" he said. Sans felt his eye twitch. _That was intentional._

"It's Sans, moron." she said, whapping him. He looked at her, feigning confusion.

"I'm sorry, what did I say?" he said. Sans wanted to lunge at him, but instead continued to bounce his leg under the table. Papyrus glanced at Sans, but Sans ignored it. His brother may act the fool sometimes, but he was surprisingly observant.

"sand." Sans said, shrugging. "s'fine." _Get fucked._

"See? It's fine." Will said, grabbing a menu. "Did you guys already order?" he shook Papyrus's hand again, which Papyrus was extremely excited about.

"Not yet," said Jackie. "Where's Hannah?"

"She uh, she couldn't make it." Will said quickly. Sans immediately recognized the deflect, and his interest was piqued. How well did she know him? He slyly took his phone out, and sent a quick text.

 

s: knock knock

 

"No biggie. I was craving Thai all day anyway. And sake boooombs" Sans was drumming his fingers on the table, trying not to be impatient. His neighbor looked at him, and his eyes flickered back and forth between her and his phone, until she finally got the idea. He watched as she fidgeted in her purse for a moment.

 

**h: Too embarassed to say the joke out loud?**

 

He didn't respond. She knew how this went. _C'mon, bite._

 

 **h: Who's there?**  
s: avenue  
**h: Avenue who?**  
s: avenue known this guy long?

Sans was trying to keep himself together, all he knew was this guy was a danger - and it could possibly be to her _and_ Papyrus. Jackie noticed them texting and looked at her. She mouthed "fuck off". Sans couldn't help but grin at that.

 

h: Yeah, I'll fill you in later.

 

Sans tried to shrug casually, internally sighing with relief and putting his phone away. She elbowed Will suddenly.

"Pick your damned food already, I'm freaking starving."

"Fine, fine! Jeez, you're so demanding."

The waitress came over, and everyone placed their order. Will immediately ordered sake bombs - Papyrus and Sans looked at one another, confused. What on earth were those? It was clearly for the entire table.

Will handed out a little cup to everyone, and the waitress came with glasses of beer for everyone as well. Sans sniffed the cup and let out a huff. Alright, booze. He was familiar with booze. Papyrus, on the other hand, was not.

"This is in celebration of Papyrus joining our team - the first... uh..." he thought for a moment, choosing his words carefully, "The first extraordinarily talented monster in our restaurant. May your career with us be long, and happy!" He set up the shots for everyone - Sans and Papyrus stared at theirs, confused. Was this procedure of some sort?

"HOW DOES THIS WORK?" Papyrus asked. Sans looked at his, rubbing his hand on his skull.

"i'm guessing we drop it into the beer?" he said. Papyrus gasped.

"OH! THIS IS ALCOHOL? THIS IS EXCITING!" Papyrus enthused. Sans groaned a little. He knew this group though Papyrus was loud. This wasn't going to help.

"Yep, we all drop them in at the same time after I count to three and shout 'kanpai'!" Will exclaimed. "Ready?" He waited until everyone had their drinked prepped in front of them. "Ichi... ni... san!"

"KANPAI!" everyone shouted - the brothers chimed in a few seconds late, and everyone dropped their shots in.

"HOW FANTASTIC!" Papyrus said, then realized everyone was drinking theirs - he followed suit. "HOW NOT FANTASTIC!" he said, wiping his mouth, making a disgusted face.

"Not a fan?" the neighbor said, laughing a little, cleaning up the mess they had made. There was bits of sake and beer spilled all over the table.

"NOT AT ALL. BUT THANK YOU WILL, IT WAS VERY NICE OF YOU!" Papyrus said. Jackie and her burst into giggles. Will stifled his laugh and looked over at her, then gently took her chin in between his fingers. Sans noted ____'s entire body taking on a deep flush, and he stifled a growl down.

 _Why am I getting so protective_? he grumbled to himself. _You jerked off to her. She doesn't belong to you, idiot. Get over your weird fantasies._

Still, he wondered if he did that if she'd have the same reaction.

"Got some on you still." he said, wiping the side of her face with his finger. It was an extrenely deliberate move, and it was apparent that she was both yearning for more of his touch, but also desperately wanting to get away.

"Yeah, that's what napkins are for, idiot." Jackie said, smashing one in her face. She held it there for a second, then turned abruptly to Will.

"Move your butt, I need to go to the bathroom." she said to Will.

"Oh yeah, sure." he said, moving asider for her.

"I'll go with you." said Jackie immediately. She exited the booth as well.

"What is it with girls and going to the bathroom in packs? Do they do that for you guys too?" Will asked Sans. Sans laughed a little, trying to be as friendly seeming as possible.

"looks like we're not all that different." he said. Will laughed. The ladies headed off to the bathroom.

"So, you excited Papyrus?" Will asked. Papyrus nodded happily.

"I AM! IT HAS BEEN A WHILE SINCE I HAVE BEEN EMPLOYED! ABOVE GROUND HAS BEEN... DIFFICULT, BUT A CHALLENGE I SHALL RISE TO!" he said.

"Sorry to hear that. I won't lie, I haven't dealt with many of your... kind. We've had the delivery guy, and we had some out of towners come visit and were happy we didn't treat them poorly. I really think it's a shame you guys are treated that way." Will said, his tone serious. Sans frowned a little - he could tell Will was being sincere.

"won't lie either, it sucks." Sans chimed in. "but luckily there's good people like you out there. thanks for looking at papyrus for his merits, and not his appearance." _What if I'm wrong?_

"Of course. Like I said, I've never seen someone perform prep that fast during an interview! I'm honestly impressed." Will said. He reached over the table and clapped Papyrus on the shoulder. "You're gonna do great buddy." Papyrus's face lit up at the word 'buddy'.

"W-WELL! THANK YOU PAL!" he said, and Sans could tell he was excited at the prospect of making another friend. "OH YES! I REMEMBERED MY MONSTER IDENTIFICATION CARD!" he said, opening his wallet and jamming it in Will's face. Will chuckled, and took it from him.

"Thanks. This'll expidite things." he said, smiling pleasantly.

"so how long you been working at the restaurant?" Sans asked, curious.

"This one? About six years. But my family owns their own restaurant back home, so I've been in the industry I guess since I was a kid. In the blood at this point, I think. My older sister is head chef at Chef Latrouse's restaurant in Los Angeles." Papyrus gasped.

"CHEF LATROUSE!?" he practically shouted. Will's eyes widened, and nodded in surprise. "OH MY GOD! I WATCH HIM EVERY MORNING FOR NEW CULINARY TIPS TO ASSIST ME IN MY QUEST TO PERFECT MY MEALS!" Papyrus paused, then somehow got louder.

"DO YOU MEAN TO TELL ME SHE WORKS AT AVEC NOUS!?"

"Yep!" Will responded, sounding proud. "She's been there for a few years as well, she migrated from our restaurant to his."

"DO... DO YOU THINK I COULD SOMEDAY MEET HER?" Papyrus asked, and Will laughed earnestly.

"She drops by the restaurant regularly, we're pretty close." he said, and Papyrus clapped his hands together joyfully. "I'll have to introduce you two when she swings by." The waitress came to the table, dropping off yet another round of sake bombs. Papyrus looked at them dubiously.

"THAT WOULD BE MOST DELIGHTFUL!" Papyrus said. Sans frowned inwardly again, confused. There was something off about Will. He was so congenial, but at the same time something shifty about him as well. He was mulling over it when Jackie and her bestie came back to the table. As Will got up, Jackie practically shoved her into the booth first, placing her across from Sans, and Jackie sitting next to Will. Will was visibly perturbed by this, but said nothing. He edged the drink towards _____, but Jackie slapped his hand.

"_____ threw up. So I'm cutting her off." Jackie said to Will. Will practically leaned over Jackie, looking concerned.

"Oh jeez, you alright? I'm sorry, do you need to go home? I can --"

"Nope! It's fine, I got this." Jackie interrupted him. "Also, I drove here so... I'm going to sit this one out." She took the two additional drinks and slid one to Sans, and the other to Will. Something had transpired in the bathroom, Sans could tell. Sans's neighbor's eyes looked up guiltily at Sans, but he was staring at Will.

_I'll handle this._

"i'm game if you're game." he said, but his voice was laced with an undercurrent of another sort of challenge.

"You're on, little man." Will responded, his knuckles turning white around the glass while wearing a cheery smile.

"DO I HAVE TO DRINK THIS?" whined Papyrus. Sans and Will looked at Papyrus and said in unison, "Yes."

"OK, BUT NO MORE FOR ME PLEASE." he said, and unceremoniously poured his shot into his drink. Sans and Will looked to one another - did their countdown, and drank. _Good god, this tastes like shit. Why does he like this garbage?_

But if anything, Sans wasn't going to lose. This wasn't like him, he normally would shrug off a challenge or a game like this, but for whatever reason, that wasn't happening tonight. In the back of his mind, he heard himself saying what an idiot he was, but he didn't care. He didn't like this guy, and he didn't like him because he didn't _know._

Six drinks later, he was mildly regretting his actions. Sure, it tasted like shit, but with each passing drink it got a bit more tolerable. By the fifth drink, he was convinced Will was going to withdraw, and was even looking forward to the sixth. Papyrus stopped at two, and was wobbling in his seat, occasionally starting up what sounded like a sea shanty then stopping a few bars in. He'd then look around sluggishly, making sure no one heard, then grin at Sans. Honestly, why didn't they drink together more often?

This was a great time.

Sans had been slowly eating his noodles, mostly when his neighbor wasn't watching, but at this point was smashing them into his face practically. She was giggling at something, and he inwardly frowned. Well she wasn't laughing at one of _his_ fantastic jokes.

He must fix this.

"psst. hey." he said, his head moving up towards her in a seasick motion as he learned forward as much as he could.

"What?" she asked, her eyes dancing with curiosity.

"knock knock." he slurred, and her face lit up. Aww yeah, he was gonna nail this one.

"Who's there?"

"jusssstin."

"Justin who?"

"juuuuustin time for dinner." he revealed, delighted with himself, stabbing his noodles with his fork. She burst into laughter, and Sans felt both victory and relief. This was going good, very good. Will looked to Sans.

"A _comedian_ , eh?" Will asked. Sans's mirth faded, remembering the handful of times he had been called that. It was never pleasant.

"you could say that." he replied, giving a snarky smile. Papyrus groaned.

"DO NOT ENCOURAGE HIM. HIS JOKES ARE TERRIBLE." Papyrus said, dropping noodles into his lap for what seemed like the hundreth time.

"they make you smile, paps." Sans said, smacking Papyrus on the back.

"YES, AND I HATE IT." he replied, finally managing to get a huge wad of his noodles around his utensil and taking the whole thing in at once.

"So how... s'how do you eat?" Will asked. "I know you had a funny answer this weekend Sand, but it can't just be all.. magic n'stuff. How 'bout a real explanation?" _Sand, again. Intentional, again._

"Sans." his neighbor corrected. Sans smiled a little to himself, feeling a bit happy she was standing up for him. Will snorted derisvely. He mumbled 'whatever' to himself, and Sans went against his better judgement and decided to antagonize him. No overlap to help him through these waters, he didn't give a shit right now.

"i didn't bring my textbook with me, didn't know i'd be schooling someone so thoroughly tonight." Sans responded, trying to look casual about his next bite. Jackie almost choked on her food and guffawed, while his neighbor giggled behind her hand. Will looked positively livid, then attempted to regain his composure. Other people might be fooled, but Sans could see him seething behind his smile.

"Good one, shorty. I'll remember that one." he said. Will's eyes darted towards Papyrus, and Sans immediately felt himself bristle at that. _Yeah, I'll remember **that** too asshole._

"it's pretty simple, i got a mouth y'see..." Sans carefully tilted his head back, and then opened his mouth all the way. "and i got teeth too, weird right? and then the food goes in here, and the teeth come together and..." he continued, but he could see Will was visibly uncomfortable. He generally didn't show his teeth, mostly because it scared people. Papyrus was lucky, he was blessed with a 'normal' set of teeth.

"Alright, alright, I get the idea.. sheeesh.." Will said, trying to wave Sans off - but Sans was pleased with the effect - he looked a little rattled. Sans smirked to himself, keeping his chompers out in full display. For whatever reason, he looked at his neighbor, who was looking directly at him. _Shit._

But she didn't look scared, or disgusted. She looked... interested? More than interested. When he locked eyes with her, her entire face turned beet red. Sans couldn't help but grin even more, enjoying watching her squirm a little. She immediately picked up her fork and began picking at her noodles.

"This food is really fucking good." she said to no one in particular.

"Yeah." said Jackie, her voice low.

"I LOVE ALL OF YOU." said Papyrus, and he stuffed his face full of his food.

 

* * *

 

It didn't stop at six shots. Legally, Will should be dead, Sans thought to himself. He was definitely a skeleton who could handle his liquor, and he enjoyed when humans thought they'd be able to drink him under the table. Years of drinking to forget does that to a person - or a monster, in this case. When he stood, he wobbled more than he liked though - Papyrus on the other hand was close to incapable of standing. Will was acting like nothing was wrong, but was suspiciously learning up against the booth. Jackie was a little smarter than that, and began calling cabs for everyone to get home safely, since she was calling one for herself anyway.

Sans watched as his neighbor slipped out to get some air, and leaned up against the booth as well, giving a small smile. Will noticed this, glancing at Sans.

"Cute, isn't she?" he asked blatantly. Sans shrugged, trying to seem uninterested.

"for a human, i guess." he responded. Will seemed pleased with this, momentarily.

"Yeah, guess that wouldn't be your thing, would it? Humans and monsters and all that."

 _Oh, I'd probably be a better fit for her than you would, jackass_. Suddenly, there was an overlap. But shit, the booze was making it awkward to decipher. They came to him in a flood, and they were even overlapping themselves.

 _Tell him every human has a skeleton in them, or can_. Will does NOT look pleased. He storms out.

 _Say that there's always a first for everything, as a joke_. Will does NOT look pleased. He makes an awkward joke and leaves to go outside as well.

 _Say nothing_. Shrug. Will laughs, nods and heads out.

"yeah, can't really see the appeal." Sans said, lying literally through his teeth. Will gave an easy smile, but Sans didn't like it.

"Don't blame you. I'm gonna go smoke a cig, I'll be right back." he said, clapping Sans on the shoulder. He gave Papyrus a pat on the back as well on his way out, and Sans once again bristled at that. He may be acting the friend, but there was no disgusing that threat earlier. Sans sighed, letting his weight press into the booth as Will had been doing. The fact that he was no longer trying to work against gravity was immensely relieving.

"SHOULD YOU ONLY CALL ONE CAB FOR OUR MUTUAL FRIEND AND US? WE DO LIVE ACROSS FROM HER." Papyrus was saying, his volume a tad higher than normal. Jackie smacked her forehead and nodded as Papyrus loomed over her.

"Yeah, thanks! I forgot about that for some reason. Let me call the cab company back and cancel the one taxi. Hey, where did Will go?" she asked, spinning around. Sans looked at her, shrugging.

"outside. wanted to smoke." he replied. Jackie frowned.

"Ugh, that slimeball better not be pestering her." she said mostly to herself, then slapped a hand over her mouth. Papyrus looked surprised, as did Sans. "Ignore that, I didn't mean it."

"CONSIDER IT IGNORED!" Papyrus said, but Sans kept his mouth shut.

"i'm gonna go outside too, let 'em know we're sharing a cab." Sans said, and Jackie looked a little relieved. "stay in here, alright paps?"

"ALRIGHT!" he said, and continued to wobble next to Jackie. Sans threw his hood on, and headed outside. He scanned the sidewalk, and saw them standing to the side.

And Will was definitely encroaching on her personal space. Sans couldn't tell whether it was something she wanted or not, but when he moved his head closer, to possibly kiss her neck, she let out an unhappy noise. Didn't this asshole have a girlfriend? And more importantly, couldn't he get the signal now that she didn't want this?

Against his better judgement, Sans crossed over to them quickly.

"she looks uncomfortable." he said behind them, trying to diffuse the situation - while simultaneously stuffing down his jealousy.

"Fuck off." was all Will said, and he began to turn on his heel. His neighbor quickly grabbed Will by the shoulders as she spun.

"Will, as deputy of Drunktown, I am declaring you unfit for interaction with the public." she said quickly. "I'm sending you to the drunk tank. Inside. Now." She was using as stern a voice as possible, and he saw Will's shoulders sag.

"Whatever. You know I'm right, _____." He let go of her, and stalked back inside. Sans let out a quiet sigh, and watched as she stared out into the street at the passing cars. Sans mustered up the courage, and went to stand next to her.

"you alright?"

"I'm fine."

"you don't look alright." he said, geniunely concerned.

"Like you fucking know me?" he shot at him, and her voice was filled with venom. Sans felt his previous courage deflate immediately. _Why are you pursuing this? She's just your fucking neighbor. Let it go. Humans are complicated messes_.

"guess i don't." he said simply. He didn't feel an overlap, but knew the right thing to do was to leave. He began to head back towards the restaurant, when a timid voice came out of her.

"Knock knock."

He didn't turn. _That's not fair_.

"who's there?"

"Iowa."

"iowa who?"

"Iowa big explanation to someone who deserves it." she said, and Sans turned. As she turned around, her face looked miserable - weary. It was a face he recognized, one that he himself wore when no one was looking. He tried to grin, keep it together, but he was already miserable - he didn't need this on top of everything.

_Keep your distance. You always have. It's always better._

"idaho who you're talking about." he said, his words clearly cutting her. He gave a side shrug, then headed back inside to the restaurant. He was fleeing the situation, it was the safest thing to do right now. The gentle glow of the restaurant was a much preferred to the harsh street lights and broken woman outside.

Sans came back in, and was greeted to Papyrus and Will laughing at some story one of them just told. Jackie looked at Sans.

"Everything okay?" she asked, and her eyes darted to Will.

"yeah, it's fine." he said. He and Will locked eyes, and Will gave him a nod - one that said, 'let's talk.' Sans sighed inwardly, and turned back outside.

When they both got out there, she was already gone. _Probably took a cab on her own_ , he thought. Will didn't seem to mind for some reason.

"Hey man, sorry." he started, "I'm having a rough time right now."

"yeah?" Sans asked. He wasn't really interested, but it was simpler to make peace.

"Yeah, I'm dealing with my girlfriend, Hannah. Kinda got into a fight this morning, mostly my fault. _____ and me have been friends for years, y'know?" he said, stuffing his hands in his pockets. Sans slapped a hand to his skull as suddenly the overlap hit him like a truck. Words were spilling out of Will's mouth, and he didn't have time to analyze like he normally did for some reason, likely the booze.

 _He tells you what he thinks of you. It's unpleasant._ You walk away. Everything stays neutral.

 _You fight. You're fighting. He's telling you things you never wanted to her._ For some reason, this is the one that sticks.

Sans stared at Will, as he was clearly pouring his heart out. He could hear kinder words, simpler words being used, but all he heard was the overlap.

No. All he _wanted_ to hear was the overlap.

"You don't get it, do you?" Will said, his voice echoing in his head. "I got her wrapped around my finger, bone-guy. And let me tell you, it's been going on for a long time. So don't think your pathetic ass is going to slip in and win her on the technicality of being 'interesting' or 'different'. If it weren't for you," he said, sucking air in between his teeth, "I woulda gone home with her tonight, like I have so many times before. And I would taken these hands..."

Sans didn't want to know anymore, he was growing livid. This _shitbag_! He rocked on his feet, wishing it would go away. But he needed to _know_.

"...and pleasured her all god damned night. You know, nice, fleshy hands. Good for touching. Then I woulda fucked her until she screamed my name, pounding her perfect pink little pussy until I blew my load all over her. And you know what? She'd beg for more. She's fuckin' shameless, bone-bag. And then I'd go home to my girlfriend, and I'd fuck _her_ too. You know why?"

Sans was shaking, but Will didn't seem to notice it. But his echo leaned right over to whisper to him.

"Because I can get away with it."

"are you serious?" Sans said out loud, halting Will in whatever he was saying at the moment.

"Am I serious? ...I guess I am. It's just been confusing, y'know?" he said, sighing. Sans's fists were balled up, his bones scrapping against one another. The echo came back full force.

"And if you tell anyone? Especially her? I'll make sure your brother is blacklisted from every restauraunt here to the coast." He followed this with a cruel laugh.

"why?" was all Sans could say, and Will looked surprised, turning to him.

"I guess... well, I don't know why I'm telling you this, but I guess I love her." he said, his voice filled with a wistful sadness, and a twinge of hope. Sans was slapped back into reality. "But don't tell anyone, okay?" Sans had to still his eye from twitching.

"you love yourself." Sans said, his voice brimming with venom. Will's face turned to one of shock, not expecting that response. "don't fool yourself, because you're not fooling me."

"Wow, that's fuckin' rude." he said, rubbing at his nose. "Guy pours his heart out to you, and you come back with that? Is that a monster custom."

"fuck you." Sans said, and was shocked by how aggressive he was being. What was going on? Normally he could cool it, keep himself completely calm.

"Whatever, asshole." Will said, "You and your brother definitely aren't made from the same stuff. Don't know why I bothered talking to you."

"me neither." Sans practically hissed, and went back into the restaurant. His head was spinning - he didn't care that this guy just spilled his heart out, because he _knew_. He _knew_ the shit he had said before. And the likelihood of any of that being different was unlikely. This love-filled facade was just a cover for how absolutely _wretched_ he actually was. He was the Judge, and his role would never cease.

"Hey, what's wrong?" Jackie said, Sans's face actually a scowl. He quickly rearranged his face.

"nothin'. i think that she --" he started, when Will burst inside.

"She's _gone_!" Will shouted at Sans.

"well yeah, thought that was apparent." Sans said, shrugging. Will raked his fingers through his hair, took a menacing step forward.

"What the fuck did you say to her?" he asked, clearly livid. Sans again shrugged.

"nothing important. what, did you think she just vanished?"

"I thought she was in the bathroom! _You,_ outside, _now_." Will said, and Papyrus looked absolutely terrified. Sans's inner calm he had just mustered shattered, seeing his brother like that. He stalked outside just as quickly, Will spinning around to face him angrily.

"I don't know why she says you're a good guy, what kinda fucking lies are you spinning to her?" he shouted, and Sans took a deep breath in.

"none of your business. she's not your girlfriend, so why do you care where she went?" he said, and that clearly struck a nerve.

"Listen, _bone-bag_ , she IS my business!" he said, stepping up, toe-to-toe with Sans.

"not anymore." he said simply, and Will's teeth clenched.

" _Excuse me_?"

"you heard me. go home to your girlfriend, heather or whatever."

"Hannah." Will immediately corrected, but Sans could tell he regretted saying her name. "And I will, as soon as I --"

Jackie came flying out of the restaurant, glaring at both Will and Sans.

"What the _ever-loving fuck_ are you two doing?! You can hear you guys inside! Calm the fuck down!"

"it's nothing to worry about." Sans said, trying to both hold his ground and calm Jackie.

"Says you." Will said, and without warning a fist came flying from the left and slammed directly into Sans's face. Jackie let out a gasp, and Sans's vision blurred as his neck snapped sharply to the right, fuzzy shapes driving past him at what seemed an alarming speed. His footing staggered - the punch hurt, and lord knows he didn't have the ability to take hits like that. He had to end this sooner than later.

"hey, moron. you an undertaker?" he asked. Will had his fists up, ready to fight, but he put them down momentarily, confused.

"What? No, why the hell do you ask?"

" _because you made a grave mistake_." Sans said, chuckling to himself. Will, for whatever reason, was incited by this. He didn't look like he was going to strike, but he crossed the space between them, and took Sans's shirt collar into his fist.

"Listen, _comedian_ ," he snarled, and Sans could feel his heart skip a beat in terror for a moment, "You stay the hell away from _____. Move. I don't care. But erase her from your memory, bud, or I'll erase you."

"so threatening." Sans said, as calm as possible. This seemed to piss Will off even more. "tell me, do you make a habit of threatening people who get close to her? or is this just a weekend hobby?"

"Fuck. You." Will shouted, his breath stinking of sake and curry. "Trust me, I have ways of making her forget you." he said, and he took on an extremely cruel smirk. Sans was done with this.

"writhe on the floor where you belong." he said casually, and pointed down. Will looked confused, but looked back up and Sans's left eye flared a vibrant cyan. "thanks."

Will crumpled like a broken marionette, an uncomfortable crack emanating from a joint somewhere. _Probably something popping out of place, definitely not a break_ , Sans thought to himself. If he wanted to threaten him, he needed to know where he sat on the pecking order right now. Jackie let out a shriek, and ran inside quickly.

"here's how this is gonna play out, kid. you're gonna forget this happened, how 'bout that?" Sans said, his voice an even keen. "you're gonna keep this shit to yourself, and i'm gonna walk away and forget you ever hit me. why's that? i'm a nice guy. what can i say?"

Will struggled under the effects of his magic, but it wasn't doing him any good. Sans sneered at his pitiful attempts.

"and more importantly, you're gonna leave my brother out of this. you and me? we're not good. that's fine. but he's done _nothing_ to you. so..." Sans said, and he snapped his fingers for dramatic effect - from the void, as he always pulled them, came his blessed blasters. Just one, then another to make a point. "... _leave him out of it_."

An ungodly shriek came from Will as the blaster approached him, it's mouth wide open, it's fangs still dripping with residual void matter. Sans looked at this, trying not to enjoy it too much.

" _SANS_!" came a voice, and Sans spun, his brother looking positively _furious_. Sans immediately cut off his magic, his blasters quickly vanishing back to whence they came, and Will regaining his ability to move. Papyrus crossed over to his brother, and enveloped him in a strong hug. "STOP." Will quickly scrambled backwards, staring wild-eyed at the two standing there. "THIS WILL GAIN YOU NOTHING."

"fuck -- paps, i --" Sans began, but Papyrus patted the top of his head.

"I DO NOT CARE. WE SHOULD LEAVE HERE, POLITELY. YOU GO INSIDE, AND TELL JACKIE WE SHALL BE DEPARTING." he said, turning Sans to the restaurant door. "GO."

"yeah, okay." he said, shuffling to the door in shame.

"WILL, I SINCERELY APOLOGIZE." he said, holding a hand out to him. Will stared at Papyrus's hand, clearly terrified. "I CAN ASSURE YOU HE WILL NEVER DO THAT AGAIN. I DO NOT KNOW THE CAUSE OF YOUR ALTERCATION, BUT I TRUST THAT YOU CAN BOTH MOVE ON AND BECOME THE BEST OF FRIENDS SOMETIME DOWN THE ROAD."

Will stared another moment, then started laughing - almost maniacally. He took Papyrus's hand in his, and was lifted to his feet. "I... shit. You're a great guy Papyrus, but your brother --"

"I WILL NOT HEAR WHATEVER IT IS YOU HAVE TO SAY! I AM MOVING ON, AND HOPEFULLY YOU SHALL TOO. DO YOU NEED ASSISTANCE TO A CAB, OR ARE YOU ALRIGHT?" Papyrus asked, and Will looked at himself, still in shock.

"Yeah, yeah. I'm fine. Well shit, no, I'm not. I can't... I... what did he do? What were those _things_?"

"NOTHING, JUST ILLUSIONS! WORRY NOT, NO HARM SHALL COME TO YOU WHILE THE GREAT PAPYRUS IS AROUND!" he said, patting Will on the head, similarly to Sans. He was trying his best at damage control.

Meanwhile, Sans was apologizing profusely to Jackie.

"What did I even see?" she asked, and Sans sighed.

"just me being an idiot. i'm sorry jackie. i shouldn't have done that, period. and it won't happen again."

"It damned well better not!" she shouted, as the staff glared at them. "Look, we better get out of here before we're banned for life."

"yeah, shit. i'm sorry." Sans said, rubbing the back of his skull. He looked absolutely mortified, as he should be. _Fucking idiot. IDIOT!_ It wasn't just his perception he was worried about - using magic against someone like that was an absolutely heinous offense under monster law. He prayed Will and Jackie didn't know about that, and was trying to patch things up as best as possible.

"You should be." Jackie said, echoing his thoughts. "C'mon, let's go." She sounded disgusted with him, and Sans felt like absolute trash. He actually liked Jackie. When they got outside, Papyrus was waving to a departing cab.

"Was that Will?" Jackie asked, and Papyrus turned.

"YES! AND I BELIEVE THAT IS ANOTHER ONE OF OUR CABS RIGHT NOW!" he said, waving to it. The taxi pulled over, and Jackie looked at them both.

"Look. I know you guys aren't familiar with how things work up here but... you can't do that!" she said, frustrated. "Sans, I got your number. _Expect a call_." Shivers went down Sans's spine - that was the same tone Toriel used when someone disobeyed an order.

"yes ma'am." he said respectfully. Jackie glanced at Papyrus, and without saying a word the two hugged. He gave her a peck on the top of her head, and she got into the taxi without saying anything else.

"WELL, I MUST SAY YOU'VE THROUGHLY BUNGLED THIS OUTING!" Papyrus said, both admonishing Sans and trying to lighten the mood. "PERHAPS NEXT TIME WE CAN HAVE DINNER WITH LESS FIGHTING!"

"yeah, that'd be good. paps, hey..."

"WORRY NOT BROTHER, I SHALL NOT REPORT YOU TO THE AUTHORITIES." he said, smiling. "HOWEVER THAT DOES MAKE ME AN ACCOMPLICE, SO NOW WE ARE PARTNERS IN CRIME!"

"heh, yeah." Sans said, mustering a weak chuckle. "we should probably get home, and check on _____."

"AGREED! SHALL WE TAKE A TAXI OR --"

"i've used enough magic today, i think." Sans said, ashamed. "our ride should be here soon, right?"

"INDEED." Papyrus said, putting an arm around Sans's shoulders. They waited there in the cold for quite a while, before a cab pulled up. The ride home was silent as well, which meant Papyrus was thinking about something serious - normally he was non-stop chatter. Sans leaned up against the door, and looked out the window. Maybe they should move? No, he couldn't do that to Papyrus again. Besides, they weren't here, so there was no reason to.

As they went upstairs to their floor, Sans paused in front of his neighbor's door.

"YOU SHOULD CHECK ON HER, OR AT LEAST APOLOGIZE." he said, and went inside without another word. Sans sighed, he was right. He knocked.

Then he knocked again. No answer. Fuck. He rang the doorbell - still no answer. He saw a light shining under the door, so he figured she was ignoring him. He put his head up against the door, and groaned.

"i'm sorry." was all he could muster, then walked away. He went into his home, then paused for a moment. He should at least leave her a message - and if she was sleeping, he didn't want to wake her. Not that the doorbell didn't help. He went into the kitchen, and grabbed a post-it note.

 _I'm sorry I'm a fuckup, and I possibly ruined an amazing friendship._ No, too honest.

 _Sorry._ No, too impersonal.

 _Forgive me, I'm a horrible monster, and I'm sorry you had to find out._ Would that even fit?

 _Sorry, I'm a complete bonehead._ That would work. He scribbled it hastily on the note, and left it there. She'd likely see it in the morning, and would know it was him.

He went to the couch, and plopped down. What was wrong with him? Why was he behaving like that? Will wasn't acting like that in _this_ timeline. He instead told him how he felt, and how he constantly ruined his own chances, and that he loved her...

No, screw that! If he was like that in previous timelines, he definitely was like that now. In his experience, nothing every changed. _Nothing_. He was the outside influencer, as was that damned kid. Everything stayed the same, in motion as it should - and he doubted the kid had anything to do with this.

Will was a shitlord. Plain and simple. He was sticking to that version of events.

_Whether or not it's right._

He kicked off his shoes, and leaned back into the pillows. His poor blasters, he should probably apologize to them too.

 _Whatever_ , was his final thought as he passed out from the day's exertions.

As usual, he dreamt of nothing.


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> OFF HIATUS  
> ITDM will be updating to catch up with ITQM!

If it were possible for him to wear his teeth down, he'd have done it in a single day. The following morning after the blow up at the Thai restaurant, Sans had stood at his neighbor's doorstep, his fist clenched and raised to knock, only to have it swing down heavily. It was too early, and realistically she probably already left for work anyway, right? The post-it note was gone, so she must be. He groaned to himself, trying to apologize first thing in the morning probably wasn't the best idea, besides.

He dragged his feet all the way to work, his mind racing over the previous night's events. Good god, that ridiculous  _overlap_. He slapped a boney hand over his aching head, trying to recall some of it. Sure, he had some sake, but he normally could get a grip on what was going on pretty well. Will had confessed he loved her, hadn't he? But... at the same time, he was admitting that he used her. Right? 

_Right?_

"fuckin' idiot." Sans grumbled to himself, entering the store. He waved a half-hearted hello to Dolores at the front, who was chipper as always, and went to the back to grab his nametag and clock in.

"Morning Sans. Feeling better?" said his co-worker, Kenny.

"yo, ken. and yeah, thanks." Sans said, not really looking at him.

"Why so glum, chum?" Kenny asked, chugging down an energy drink. Sans let out a heavy sigh and shrugged a shoulder. "Giiiiirl troubles?" Kenny said with a laugh, not really meaning anything by it, but Sans gave him a pointed look. "Oh. Shit. Sorry man."

"nah, just a friend. kinda was a jerk..." he paused - he was supposed to be sick. "...the other day." Sans muttered. He did the right thing. It doesn't matter if it was in this timeline, or the last timeline, the results would still always be the same. He knew this from experience, right? People never  _really_ changed, did they? Not humans, anyway. 

"Ahh, gotcha. Is it uh..." Kenny looked a little flustered, and he was making weird motions with his hands. "...is it a human girl or a monster girl?"

"huh?" Sans looked surprised. "no, it's a human girl. dunno many other monsters here."

"Well!" Kenny said, jerking a thumb to himself, "If you need any advice on making it up to females in the human department, good ol' Kenny here knows how!"

"He sure does," came a voice from behind them, as the florist manager Lorinda walked in and clocked in. "Kenny, don't you need to go do just that to Michele, who's shift you  _didn't_ cover last week?"

"Hah! Yeah! Yeah, about that..." Kenny said, and Lorinda put her hands up. 

"I don't wanna hear it! You go tell her, I don't give two figs." she said cooly, and with a swish she was back out the door. 

"not cool." Sans said. Kenny let out a huge sigh. 

 "So how deep in are you?" Kenny asked, as the two of them headed to the stock room. Sans shrugged his shoulders noncommittally. 

"pretty deep." he replied, grabbing his inventory counter. "i really made an ass of myself. kinda got into a pissing contest with someone, and then uh... left her... on the street?"

"DUDE." Kenny slapped a hand over his face. "Okay, so we're talking nuclear levels of damage. Alright, so first of all, you gotta get her a card."

"a card?" Sans asked, confused. "for what? it's not her birthday or anything."

"No, you idiot. Like a 'I'm sorry I'm a dumbass' card or something."

"do they even make those?" Sans asked, smirking as he grabbed a box and scanned it. If they actually made those, maybe he should buy stock in the company or something.

"You're gonna find out. Then you're gonna buy some flowers, girls love flowers."

"yeah?" This was sounding like too much work already.

"Oh yeah. They absolutely lose their shit over flowers. Forget their birthday? Buy flowers. Sleep with their best friend? Buy flowers. Drive their car into a streetpost? Buy flowers. It's like a catch-all."

"huh. interesting." Sans said, doubting this a little. He scanned another box. "okay, so buy a card and flowers. what else?"

"I mean, that's basic. Maybe balloons? Jewelry" Kenny added, and Sans sighed.

"i think that's enough advice from you." he said, setting down a box.

"No man, I know what I'm talking about!" Kenny exclaimed, and Sans just laughed a bit.

"i believe you, i just can't afford all that right now, rent's coming up."

"Ah yeah, I gotcha, I gotcha." he said, rubbing the back of his neck. "Well, you'll figure something out."

"anyway, did you catch the game the other night?" Sans asked, changing topic.

"Hell yeah! I can't  _believe_ how badly they got creamed!" he said, and immediately was diverted into sports. Sans heaved a grateful sigh and went back to work, making the usual pleasantries as he always did, going through his work day.

At lunch, he couldn't help himself. He walked a few blocks, and stopped by her work. Was she there? He didn't want to walk in, in case she was still mad... but was surprised to see Peter standing behind the counter. He knew that meant she wasn't in at work. Did she stay home? Was she sick? Did she  _make it home_? Shit. 

 _Of course she did, you idiot. You saw the light on last night, remember?_ Jeez, he was starting to become paranoid. But that meant she still didn't go into work today... he hoped to god it wasn't because of him. 

No, it wasn't because of him. He's not the one who was breathing down her neck last night, hands on her like a lecherous drunk. But... 

_I left her. I knew that look. I've given that look before, in the past, I know I have. And no one's been able to help me. And she reached out, and I pretty much slapped her in the face with rejection. Heh, no wonder why I can't make friends._

He leaned against a stoplight as he waited to cross the street, thinking to himself. So what if that was the straw that broke the camel's back, as they say? He knew a thing or two about breaking, and last night she definitely looked like a woman who was on the verge of breaking down. Her and Sans  _had_ started to become decent friends, and there was something about her... besides the journal - he could just  _feel_ it with her.

 _Or is it just your hormones going out of control, you hard-up bonehead?_ he grumbled to himself.  _It's easy to talk yourself into something when there's lust in the mix._

Work dragged on after getting back. He needed to fix this somehow, it was just stirring in his gut uncomfortably. Normally, he could walk away from a situation without a second thought and leave it - it was a done deal. But this was plaguing him. He needed to apologize for what he did, it was plain and simple. He needed... he needed to be a  _friend_.

He got home that evening, to a very concerned Papyrus.

"OH BROTHER, THERE YOU ARE! HAVE YOU HEARD FROM OUR FRIEND-ACROSS-THE-WAY? I KNOCKED AND HAVE TEXTED AS WELL, BUT SHE HAS NOT RESPONDED! I WONDER IF SHE IS WELL!" he said as he walked through the door. Sans grimaced at this, and sank into the couch. He had hoped for a little bit of reprieve between work and dealing with this, to be honest.

"nah, i haven't bro. do you want me to text her?" he asked, hoping the answer would be no.

"YES, PLEASE! I WOULD GREATLY APPRECIATE THAT! MY TEXTS HAVE GONE UNANSWERED, AND THAT IS VERY UNLIKE HER!" he said, his voice quavering. 

"you text her a lot?" Sans asked, curious. Papyrus nodded vigorously. Jesus, he was lucky she still talked to them.  "alright. i'll send her a text." Sans took his phone out from his back pocket and pulled up his texts and thumbed to her. It was so simple. He just needed to text an "hey, are you okay?" or "hello" or "how are you doing?". That was it. Why was this so hard? He stared at his phone, trying to figure out what to say to her.

He looked at his half-inputted text from the previous night, an unsent message asking if she got home safe while they were in the taxi. He erased it, tapping his finger against the side of his phone.

_I can't just text her something basic, can I? I mean, everyone's checking on her right now. I'm just one more voice to the chorus. Would it come off as insincere? Would she even care?  Why would she even want to --_

"BROTHER? ARE YOU OKAY? YOU'VE BEEN STARING AT YOUR PHONE FOR QUITE A WHILE NOW." Papyrus asked.

"what? oh, yeah."

"DID YOU SEND THE TEXT?" he asked.

"yup." Sans lied, putting his phone away. Papyrus nodded happily to himself. 

"MOST EXCELLENT! I HOPE THAT WE HEAR FROM HER WITHIN THE HOUR THEN!" 

"i doubt it." Sans mumbled to himself, but Papyrus luckily didn't hear, as he was too busy already whisking away at something in the kitchen. 

"NOW SANS, WE NEED TO TALK ABOUT YOUR PRIOR USE OF MAGIC THE OTHER NIGHT." Papyrus said loudly, and Sans froze halfway at getting up. Slowly, he rounded to the kitchen, and casually leaned against the counter. "AND DON'T THINK YOU CAN SWEET TALK ME. YOU MUST BE CAREFUL, YOU COULD SERIOUSLY HURT SOMEONE."

"i know, i know." Sans said nonchalantly, but Papyrus raised his wooden spoon and waved it authoritatively at Sans. 

"DON'T YOU TREAT IT LIKE IT WAS NO BIG DEAL! YOU ARE LUCKY THAT IT WAS JUST YOU AND I, AND THAT THE HUMANS DO NOT KNOW ABOUT MONSTER MAGIC LAW! YOU COULD HAVE BEEN ARRESTED! I DO NOT WISH TO SEE MY BROTHER BEHIND BARS!"

"paps..." Sans started, and Papyrus shushed him again with the spoon. His face was unusually serious.

"DO NOT PAPS ME! WHEN YOU BRING OUT YOUR BIG BONE DOGGIES IT IS NOTHING BUT TROUBLE! DO NOT THING I HAVE FORGOTTEN THE SHED! THEY VAPOURIZED IT! I DO RATHER LIKE WILL, AND DO NOT WISH TO SEE HIM REDUCED TO AN ASH PILE BEFORE I BEGIN WORK, SO I REQUEST THAT YOU KEEP YOUR TEMPER IN CHECK."

Sans shrank into himself, and Papyrus stopped waving his spoon around, suddenly stopping in his tracks. He clacked the spoon down, and frowned.

"SANS, IT IS NOT LIKE YOU TO DO THAT. WHAT IS TROUBLING YOU? I AM HERE FOR YOU, BROTHER."

"y'know, i'd be a bad detective 'cause i'm  _tempering_ with the evidence." Sans said, snickering. Papyrus rolled his eyes and grabbed his spoon again. 

"CAN YOU EVER TAKE ANYTHING SERIOUSLY? FINE, SEE IF I CARE IF YOU'RE TAKEN TO PRISON. MAYBE THEY'LL TEACH YOU TO STOP TELLING SUCH BAD JOKES."

"maybe they'll catch me for stealing that calendar."

"YOU STOLE A CALENDAR?" Papyrus asked, looking shocked.

"yeah, and i got 12 months for it." Sans said, his smile growing huge.

"AAARRGGGGHHHH!" Papyrus yelled, storming out of the kitchen. Sans chuckled and went into his bedroom, shutting the door behind him. Ah, good ol' Paps, always falling for his tactics. He really didn't want to discuss the legal ramification of actions that night as he was full aware - he also simply didn't  _care_. They were on their fourth merry-go-round, as far as he could tell, and in a way, a little bit of the apathy was starting to sink in again. 

Sans sat in his desk chair, spinning around in it for a brief second before it slowed to a stop before his desk. Propping his chin up in his hands, he rested his elbows against the desk and stared at his journal. He was so, so  _sick_ of this overlap. Who was he going to lose this time around? Why the hell was his neighbor so important? Why the  _fuck_ was he damned to this stupid looped existence that only  _he_ could remember? He opened the bottom drawer and lifted a small panel towards the back - oh thank god, Papyrus hadn't found his whiskey stash still. He desperately wanted to have a drink right now, his head still hurt from the previous night's overlapping issues, and while booze wouldn't  _help_ it any, it sure as hell would  _numb_ it.

No. 

Besides, dinner was gonna be ready soon. He sighed, placing the panel back and closing his drawer. He looked at his phone, and checked his text messages, before reminding himself that he never actually sent anything.  _Idiot..._

_Maybe I'll see her tomorrow? I'll make it up to her tomorrow. Yeah..._

He tapped his fingers on his desk, looking at the mess that was strewn across it. Idly, he picked up a blueprint for a project he never finished. 

"pfft. do i ever finish what i start?" he said to himself, looking it over. 

"SANS!" came Papyrus's voice outside. "SUPPER!"

"comin' paps!" Sans said, and tossed the blueprint down on the desk. "'nother day, i guess." and walked out to the dinner table, sitting down to a heaping plate of - once again - spaghetti.

"SPIT IT OUT SANS. I KNOW YOU WELL ENOUGH TO KNOW WHEN YOU'RE CONCERNED. YOU'RE WORRIED ABOUT OUR NEW FRIEND, AREN'T YOU?" Papyrus asked after a few minutes of eating in silence.

"...yeah." Sans finally admitted. 

"WELL, SHE IS NOT ANSWERING HER DOOR, AS I WILL ADMIT I TRIED KNOCKING AGAIN WHILE YOU WERE IN YOUR ROOM." Papyrus stated, rubbing at his chin. "I MAY BE ANNOYING HER, I'M NOT SURE. BUT THE POWER OF FRIENDSHIP WILL PREVAIL! YOU DID SORT OF MAKE A BLUNDER THE OTHER DAY, BUT I AM SURE YOU SHALL RECOVER."

"eh, maybe." Sans said, rubbing the back of his neck. He spooled some noodles around his fork, and took a bite. Papyrus nodded to himself.

"YOU WILL THINK OF SOMETHING! YOU HAVE BEEN SURPRISINGLY LESS LAZY SINCE WE HAVE BEEN ABOVE GROUND, SO I BELIEVE IN YOU."

"heh, gotta change that, i miss being so lazy." Sans said, but he felt a chill go down his spine just thinking of the past. He didn't miss being that lazy. He was that lazy for a  _reason_. And he was getting lazy again, and he knew exactly why.

"I'M SURE YOU DO. BUT I'M HERE TO PREVENT THAT FROM EVER HAPPENING! THAT REMINDS ME, HOW IS WORK GOING?"

"oh! work is going good. getting along with everyone, no one's been rude except a few customers, it's been really nice actually."

"THAT IS FANTASTIC! I HOPE TO HAVE SIMILAR EXPERIENCES LIKE YOU ARE HAVING WHEN I BEGIN MY NEW JOB! I AM SO EXCITED!" Papyrus said happily, grinning from one side of his face to the other. Then his tone dropped to a more serious one. "PLEASE DO NOT THREATEN MY FUTURE BOSS AGAIN PLEASE."

"you got it." Sans said with an easy wink, and Papyrus clapped his hands excitedly, all past transgressions apparently now forgotten.

The two of them chattered about various things until dinner concluded, Papyrus thrilled about his first day at work, and Sans excited to walk him to it. All in all, despite the looming feeling in his chest, the day was ending well. 

* * *

 Something had changed that morning. 

 Sans felt  _great_.

"mornin' paps." Sans said, a cheery tune whistling through his teeth. Papyrus looked surprised as Sans was getting ready for work, but it didn't last long as his giddiness to go to his first day couldn't be contained. 

"OH SANS, I HOPE I DO WELL!" he near-shouted, and Sans patted him on the arm.

"paps, you're gonna do great." Sans said, absolutely meaning it. He walked his brother down to the restaurant proudly for his first day, and gave him a big brotherly hug. "now if ya need anything, call me, ok? i'll have my phone on all day, so call me up if anything happens. anything at all."

"SANS, I SHALL BE FINE." Papyrus insisted.

"i know, i know. ya got this." Sans said, finger gunning Papyrus, and Papyrus finger gunned Sans back. 

"I LOVE YOU BROTHER! I SHALL SEE YOU AFTER WORK!" Papyrus said, going into the building.

"love you too bro." Sans said, smiling. Sans waited outside the door for a minute or two before heading off to work himself with a lightness to his step. Today was a good day! The weather looked to be clearing up, his brother was on his first day on the job, and  _he_ was gonna clear up this mess with himself and his neighbor. 

Kenny had been partially right. After a series of googling, he had looked up apology protocol. It seemed that yes, flowers and cards and gifts did seem to be the way to do it. Depending on the type of apology, or what you did also played into the factor. But he wanted it to be sincere, and from him. So he was gonna do it  _right_. 

And he was gonna do it with flowers and shitty puns.

He already looked up a bunch of snacks he knew she liked that he could make halfway decent puns out of that sounded like apologies, but flowers he didn't know much about. Luckily, they had a floral department at his work, so that was already taken care of.  _Bam!_ he thought,  _A plan coming together!_

He kept waiting for an overlap all day, but it never came. Had he never done this before? Maybe he never apologized to her.  _Or maybe I never rejected her._

Shortly after work, he went to the floral department and leaned against the counter. "hey lorinda." he said.

"Hey Sans. What'cha need?" she asked.

"a big bouquet. the kind that say 'i'm sorry, you're awesome and i'm an idiot.'"

"Oooh, honey. What'd you do?" she asked, immediately heading from behind the counter to survey her plants.

"it's a long story, but i hurt someone's feelings. and i didn't mean to." he said. Lorinda clicked her tongue against the roof of her mouth in disappointment.

"Men're the same whether they're monsters or human, huh?" she said, half-laughing to herself. "Here, this is a beautiful one. Not too expensive, not too over the top, and it'll send the message that you're  _really_ sorry." she said. It was a lovely bouquet mixed with sunflowers, blue irises, some orange roses and violet carnations. 

"i dunno much about flowers, so if you say so." Sans shrugged, and Lorinda nodded her head.

"Honey, I'd have you fill her whole house with flowers if I could." she said with a laugh and Sans groaned. 

"just a bouquet'll do." he said, pulling out his wallet. 

"You gonna get her a card?" she asked, ringing it up. Sans shook his head.

"no, got a better idea. was going to, but none of them screamed to me the specific need. so i'm making something of my own, if you will."

"Homemade is better anyway." Lorinda said with a small smile. "You're a sweet guy Sans. Don't change, alright?" She wrapped the flowers up and handed it to him. "Bones n'all."

"heh. don't think i could if i wanted to." he said with a wink. "have a good one lorinda."

Sans walked off with his bouquet and snacks in tow, his master plan boiling in his head. He knew he'd beat both his neighbor and Papyrus home today, and would be able to get everything set up. It was brilliant, really. He was back to whistling his merry tune and almost back to his apartment, when he spotted what he thought was a familiar person on the street.

It was her. With _Will_. Arms intertwined in a tight knit, laughing, having a great time. Sans stopped in his tracks, his stomach feeling like it sank to his feet, feeling numb as people bumped into him. His fingers slowly curled around the paper wrapping of the flowers as his mind raced, trying to make sense of what he was feeling at the moment. Was this anger? Disappointment?  _Jealousy_? 

Did it even matter? He was a monster, that's what got him into this whole mess in the first place.

And here he was, standing in the middle of the sidewalk like a goddamned fool with a handful of flowers and a bag full of food for...  _what?_

He could feel his plan falling apart as he stood there, and he felt no overlap. This wasn't a plan. It never  _was_ a plan. He went off the rails on this one.  _You idiot!_ He stormed by the bins and shoved the bouquet in angrily as he passed, pushing down on the top with a fury at himself. How  _stupid_ could he possibly be? _Like some idiot skeleton was going to come in with flowers and cheap supermarket snacks and make everything better after you left her in the cold?_ What sort of preposterous universe did he live in? He slammed the door to the stairwell open, and trudged upstairs - but he could still hear them talking on the stoop. Why wouldn't they go in?!

"...care, hot stuff." Will said. Ugh, hot stuff? Really? He gnashed his teeth together - didn't this schmuck have a girlfriend still?

"Later, cool guy." she said, sounding wistful. Sans grumbled, continuing upward as Will came down and saw him, his eyes widening in surprise - then they narrowed.

"Sans." he said, his voice full of venom.  _Clearly he didn't learn his lesson last night, did he? Not a bright guy._

"will." Sans said, as cool as possible. Could today possibly get any worse? Sans heaved himself to the top step and looked to his left, only to see his neighbor awkwardly fumbling with her keys.

"hey." he said.

"Oh! Hey Sans." was all she said. He could tell, in the uncomfortable moment of silence that hung there that she didn't want to be standing there with him. He decided to end it.

"well, see ya." Sans said, unlocking his door and unceremoniously going inside. His door closed quietly behind him, and as he closed it, he slid down back against it, letting out a heavy sigh of defeat. He felt so, so tired. He put his hands over his face, sitting against the door for some time, trying to make sense of the flood of emotions that were flying around in his head right now. What  _was_ he feeling right now? He felt such an intense anger, a distrust of Will. And seeing them walking arm in arm...

_Well of course, they're **friends** you fucking nimrod! And they have been for years! You've known her, what, a few months? Get it together!_

He looked up at his ceiling, dragging a hand down and letting it fall to the floor. This was jealousy, pure and simple. Had he ever experienced this before? He wasn't really sure that he had. But why he letting this get in the way of apologizing to what was his friend? 

_Because..._

He shook his head and stood up quickly. He still was holding onto the bag of snacks, should he try to salvage this?  _Nah._ He walked over to the kitchen counter and plopped them down, leaning against it. Papyrus would be getting off work in about an hour and a half, so he'd have to cheer himself up for his brother's triumphant first day. He decided that even though tonight would be book night normally at his neighbor's house, it wouldn't stop him from having a cup of tea - in fact, he sort of looked forward to it these days. He turned on the kettle, and headed out to his own patio. 

The brother's patio was empty, save a small stool and an extremely dead plant that Papyrus had been over watering since they moved in. Sans semi-preferred it that way, less to deal with, but now it felt dismal and sad in comparison to his neighbor's cozy abode across the way. Just looking at it made him smile, with the lights strung up and the tops of her lounge chairs peeking above the railings. He mused for a moment when he heard his kettle whistling, and a thought came to him. As he went back in and took the kettle off the stove, he grabbed a post-it note and decided to make a last ditch effort. 

"i was gonna try to fix it with puns so... i'll still give it a shot." he said to himself, and began to draw. It wasn't the best geographical respresentation of Idaho, but it was close enough.

He went back out onto the balcony, and tossed it to her patio.

And he missed.

"goddamnit." he grumbled, and went back inside. He poured his tea, and drew up another one. This time, he made a tiny little airplane out of it, and threw it to the patio. It went sailing out into the street. "are you serious?"

Another one. He crumpled this one, threw it too high, and it bounced off the top of the patio and down into his other neighbor's patio. "shit. well, at least it's not a signed murder confession." he muttered to himself. About four tries later, he managed to successfully land one in her patio, but he wasn't sure the quality of the drawing stayed the same.

"yes!" he exclaimed as it landed, doing a small fist pump with the victory. He smiled for a moment, then immediately frowned. What was his deal? He couldn't figure this one out, he really couldn't. He was acting a fool for this woman. He scratched his head in thought, sipping at his tea.  _Well Sans, you're a smart guy, figure it out._ he thought. It wasn't just that she was attractive, because to be completely honest, she wasn't the type. Human, and all. He knew he had a crush, whether he wanted to admit it or not - good god, he wanked it to her the other night. But what was it about her that drew him to her, and made him  _give a damn_?

He couldn't figure this one out. He was taking risks, changing overlap choices, going off the beaten path... moreso than normal, anyway. And when he was around her, something felt  _right_ _._ He knew he'd been here before, across from her, being friends with her at least by this point. They just fell into each other so naturally, and something about her disarmed him, and made him feel like it was okay to be vulnerable for a change. When the hell had he felt  _that_ last? And more importantly, why was he fighting it so much? 

Why was he so convinced that he didn't deserve to be happy? 

_Because deep down you know that you don't._

He took a last gulp from his mug, and looked at the clock. 

"time to go get paps." he said, trying to shake himself out of his funk. He had to get her out of his mind, and Papyrus would do just that. He threw his hoodie back on, and headed out the door. As he was merely a block away, his phone rang with an unknown number.

"'llo?"

"Hello, is this Sans?" came what sounded like a familiar female voice.

"who's askin'?" he replied cautiously.

"It's me, Jackie." the voice said, and Sans felt his guard drop for a second until he realized who it was.

"hey. did i give you my number?" he asked.

"You did." she replied. "Look, we need to talk about the other night." Sans groaned.

"look, now's not a good time. i'm about to pick papyrus up from work. can we do this another time?" he pleaded.

"I'm just looking out for my friend, Sans. Do I need to worry about her?"

"no! no, not at all. never. not in a million years." he said, and he meant it. There was a long pause.

"Alright. I'll talk to you another time. You scared me, man. Probably scared Will too."

"yeah well, he's fine. just saw him and her walking together anyway."

"You  _what_?" she said, her voice scathing.  _Oops._

"er, i uh... i just ran into them, that's all." he said, feeling like he just blew it somehow. He wasn't sure if Jackie was pissed at  _him_ or  _them_.

"DO tell." she said, but her tone was anything but pleased.

"not much, uh, just on my way home and they seemed to be on their way back from somethin', that's all. just like lunch or somethin', heh. no big deal. didn't talk to them or anything. anyway, i gotta get goin'." he said hurriedly. Jackie was clacking her tongue on the other end, and Sans felt his anxiety ramping up.

"Interesting, interesting. Alright Sans, thanks for talking to me. Catch you later." she said, and then hung up abruptly. Sans looked at his phone in a bit of confusion - was he in trouble? Did he say something wrong? Good GOD humans were confusing sometimes. He stuffed his phone in his pocket and quickened his pace to the restaurant, hoping Papyrus wasn't waiting for him.

Luckily, he got there just in time. Papyrus had apparently already said all of his goodbyes, and was bouncing on his heels excitedly as Sans walked up to the doors. 

"OH SANS! THERE YOU ARE! OH WHAT A MARVELLOUS FIRST DAY I HAD!" he shouted, scaring a few people who were walking by. "MY APOLOGIES MA'AM, I DIDN'T MEAN TO STARTLE YOU, I AM JUST HAVING A WONDERFUL DAY!" he shouted at the lady who jumped at his excitement. She gave him an extremely wide berth and gave that nervous 'uh huh, okay' smile and kept walking. Sans smiled at his brother, and motioned for him to start walking next to him.

"tell me all about it bro."

"OH MY STARS! WELL, FIRST OF ALL WHAT AN EXTREMELY LOVELY AND TALENTED STAFF! THERE ARE PLENTY OF NAMES TO REMEMBER, AND I WROTE THEM ALL DOWN IN MY NOTEBOOK!" he said, whipping it out - it was bright purple and covered in various stickers. "FIRST, WE HAVE NICHOLAS, LARRY, DIANA, KIANA, JENNIFER..."

"bro, i don't need to know  _everyone_." Sans laughed, and Papyrus let out a little giggle. 

"SORRY! I DO NEED TO MEMORIZE THIS THOUGH. IT MAY HELP IF I SEE THEIR FACES THOUGH, ROUTINE MEMORIZATION OF JUST NAMES WON'T HELP ME MUCH." He put his notebook back. "THERE'S ALSO SO MANY KITCHEN TERMS AND PROTOCOL THAT I HAVE TO LEARN AND FOLLOW, MOST OF IT JUST SAFETY AND WHATNOT! SO MUCH HAND WASHING! MY MITTENS HAVE NEVER BEEN SO CLEAN!"

"yeah?" Sans asked, chuckling. Papyrus nodded.

"YES, BUT THEY ARE INSISTING I GET A SPECIAL PAIR OF KITCHEN MITTENS, AS THESE WON'T DO. I ACQUIESCED, AND SHALL BE MORE THAN HAPPY TO BE A TEAM PLAYER. THEY STRESSED TEAM PLAYING QUITE A BIT. I DON'T KNOW IF WE'RE GOING TO BE DOING SPORTS, BUT I'LL TRY MY BEST!"

"prolly not. they prolly just mean working together well."

"OH! WELL YES, I'M VERY GOOD AT THAT!"

"obviously." Sans said, smiling. 

"OH! AND AS A BONUS FOR DOING SO WELL ON MY FIRST DAY, I GOT TO BRING HOME SOME FOOD FOR DINNER!" he said, pointing to his little backpack. "YOU WILL BE DISAPPOINTED TO KNOW IT IS NOT SPAGHETTI, BUT IT IS STILL DELICIOUS. I DID NOT MAKE IT MYSELF, BUT I DID HELP CHOP UP THE CARROTS FOR IT WHICH IS VERY EXCITING."

"i can't wait to try it paps!" Sans said, not sure if he was excited because Papyrus had a hand in making it, or because it wasn't spaghetti. Papyrus continued to ramble on about work the rest of the way home, until they got to their apartment in which he paused for a moment. 

"OH YES! OUR NEIGHBOR TEXTED ME TODAY! SHE ASKED ME ABOUT WORK WHICH I THOUGHT WAS VERY SWEET!" he said, beaming. "DID SHE TEXT YOU BACK AS WELL?" Sans's smile faltered for just a moment before he picked it back up.

"i actually saw her today, said hi." he said, avoiding the answer.

"MOST FANTASTIC! I AM PLEASED. LET US HEAT UP THIS FOOD AND PARTAKE IN IT THEN! AND MAYBE YOU CAN HAVE YOUR BOOK NIGHT WITH YOUR NEIGHBOR!"

"y'know, i'm not feeling it tonight paps." Sans said as they walked up the stairs. "kinda just wanna stay in with you, maybe talk more about your work."

"REALLY?" Papyrus said beaming. 

"really." Sans said, and he gave Papyrus a gentle pat. Papyrus squealed with glee and headed into the house, and Sans headed after him, gently closing the door behind him.

* * *

Sans walked Papyrus to work for his second day, Papyrus still full of excited energy, then headed to a nearby hardware store. The project he had been putting off for ages on his desk finally got to him, and he hadn't touched it since they moved to the city anyway. He was missing a few parts, and he had a  _basic_ idea of what he needed. There was an extremely large difference between fabricating your own parts from what fell down a waterfall to being able to pick from a large selection at a store, and the first time Sans ever walked  _into_ a hardware store it was like a kid in a candy shop. He was trying to figure out what size bolt he figured he needed when he felt his phone buzz in his pocket. Probably Papyrus. He took it out, and he felt his heart skip a beat. It was her. 

 

**h: Hey, you around today?**

 

Yes! Yes he was around! He started to respond when he paused.  _Don't respond right away. Be cool. Act natural. Don't be desperate. Even if you're desperate. Are you desperate?_

God he was a mess. Why was he acting this way? Wasn't he just trying to make up with her yesterday? He slapped a hand over his face, trying to make sense of his logic. 

"You okay pal?" came a voice.

"huh? oh yeah, fine." Sans responded.

"You need help finding anything?" they said, and it was a sales clerk. Sans drew his hoodie up around his face a bit more, and turned away slightly.

"uh, nah, thanks though. i gotta figure out what size bolt i need before i even start lookin' for it. i'll let you know." he said politely.

"Alright, I'm right over here if you need anything." they said, and walked away. Sans let out a quiet sigh, and tapped his fingers against his phone's glass. Alright, he needed to just respond.

 

s: yeah, got today off. what's up?  
**h: Do you want to meet up?**

 

Oh, jeez. She wanted to talk. Not "do you wanna come over" or "do you wanna grab dinner" - this was a way of saying "we need to discuss something". It was written all over it. He groaned and plonked his head against the beam in front of him.

 

s: sure. where at? i'm running errands.  
**h: The Bean Machine?**  
s: sounds good. see you there.  
**h: When?**

 

He thought about it for a moment. There was something about her...

He needed to stop dancing around the issue. He needed to be honest with her.

  
s: whenever you get there, just text me.

 

Was he really sure about this?  _Fuck_. This could be a mistake. Was he making these decisions because of how he  _felt_? Or because of how he felt before? Or because of how he was  _going_ to feel? Christ this was confusing. He stared at the parts in front of him, all neatly arranged and glistening. Now this made sense. Machines and parts, all placed together in order, whirring together like clockwork - part of a perfect plan. None of this was going according to any kind of plan, and it was driving him absolutely mad. Did he prefer how it was, before? 

_In a weird way, yes. Now there's too many unknowns. Too many variables. I grew accustomed to the constants. The things that never changed. Now the world's changing around me, and I'm not._

He felt a sharp pain in his chest, and he realized he was diving too deep into it.  _Don't think about it._   _It's behind you._ How many times had he --

"Need anything sir?" came another voice. Another sales clerk.

"no, no thank you." Sans said, keeping his voice steady. "appreciate it though." Sans hurried out of the store and took a deep breath, relishing the fresh air for a moment. He looked at the clock on his phone - she should be there soon, assuming she was walking from their place. Heh, their place. He strolled idly, looking at the clouds in the sky to try and clear his thoughts and lighten his mood; he didn't need to be so glum when he showed up. After a few minutes, he felt his phone go off, and he checked it.

 

 **h: Here. What do you want?**  
s: be there in a minute. uh, just plain coffee.  
**h: kk**

 

That was his cue. He walked into a bagel shop, and asked where the bathroom was.

"Down the way, paying customers only." the woman said.

"just need to wash my hands." Sans said, holding out his skeletal hands. The woman looked completely taken aback, and just left her mouth open. "i'll only be a sec."

"Er.. uh, alright." she said.

"thanks a _lox_." Sans said with a wink, and headed into the bathroom, closing the door just enough behind him. With a simple flux of his magic, he tore open a doorway for himself, and stepped through and to the Bean Machine - thankfully he had been there before. The doorway wavered before him, and he picked a small corner where nobody was standing to come out of. He stepped through, the magic crackling around him like an old friend and fading away behind him.

He spotted her sitting in front of a window with both of their coffees, her leg bouncing what looked out of nervousness, causing him to frown for a second. He wanted to reach out and calm her, but decided against it.

"waiting long?" he said as smooth as possible, but apparently he startled her, as she seemed to jump a little.

"No! Oh jeez. I didn't even see you come in. Not at all. Here." she slid his coffee over to him, and he sat down across from her, wrapping his hands around it.

"thanks." he said, lifting it with a wink. She smiled, and her leg ceased bouncing finally.

"Look, I'm going to start this off with an apology right off the bat." she said, and he immediately was confused. "I hate beating about the bush, it's a waste of time." Sans' browbone raised.

"apologize for what?" he said, sipping his coffee.  _This is not what I expected._

"For snapping at you the other night. I was a jerk. It was really rude of me, and you didn't deserve it. So, I'm sorry. You don't have to accept it, but I wanted you to know that I at least was sorry."

"apology accepted." he said. "not that it was needed. you were right." She frowned at that.

"What do you mean?"

"i don't know you." he said, a little sigh coming from him. "but i'd like to." he added.   
"What do you mean?" she asked, clearly confused. He leaned back, getting comfortable in his chair, pushing his sleeves up intentionally. He watched as her eyes lingered on his bones, and when their eyes met, she looked away, embarrassed. 

"this is what i mean. listen. i know i'm different. a little weird, sometimes, sure." he chuckled. "but you dance around it sometimes like a ballerina. you don't have to."

"And here I thought I was trying to be polite." she said, taking a drink from her latte.

"you are. but how are we gonna get to know each other better if we keep doin' a lindy hop when we should be doing a foxtrot?" he said, pretty proud of his analogy.

"My stars!" she said, slapping her hands to her face in what seemed like mock surprise, "Are you asking me to prom?" Sans laughed.

"i'm trying to make a dancing analogy here." he said, rolling his eyes.

"It was a pretty good one. How do you know so much about swing dancing, anyway?" He shrugged.

"i read a lot." he said. She smirked.

"I can't see your lazy ass dancing, so that explains that." she said. She looked out the window for a moment, then sighed. "That's fair, though. I was just raised to be polite."

"with that mouth of yours?" he asked, both his brows raising. She groaned.

"Oh shut it! I'm a fuckin' lady." she said with a smirk, sipping her coffee. Sans grinned at this as well. "My mouth is amazing, it's the envy of women everywhere." Sans stared for a moment, thinking back to his google searching.

_Oh what that mouth could do._

He snorted instead.

"women everywhere, huh?"

"Yup. Don't you forget it." He shrugged. The two of them quietly laughed together, and Sans felt himself actually smile. She looked down at her coffee, and grew a little quieter. "Still, I'm sorry about what happened." Sans waved her off at this, wanting to move on.

"water under the bridge."

"Yeah well... Jackie filled me in on what happened after I left yesterday." she said, looking up. Sans froze, his thoughts growing dark. What did Jackie tell her? What did Jackie  _see_? Their conversation was so clipped the other day, it couldn't have been much, right?  _Oh god, she knows I'm just a monster. She knows what I'm capable of, doesn't she? We're laughing now, but that's not what this is about._

"oh yeah?" he said, his hand digging into his coffee cup. "what'd she say?"

"I wanted to hear your side of the story first, to be honest." she spat out. Sans chose his words carefully, before relaxing his fingers.

"i'm not really one to talk poorly about other people." Sans said as calmly as possible.

"Sans." she said. Suddenly, she reached across the table, and took his hand in hers. He was caught off guard, both by the gesture and the warmth and softness of her hand. He started to move his hand away, but it only made her grip it tighter. "Didn't we just talk about not dancing around stuff? I know you were talking about ourselves, but this concerns us, I guess. This is my friend, who was being a fucktard to my other friend, and I know on his end it was indirectly because of me." Sans frowned, but left his hand in place. He slowly curled his fingers around her hand, and sighed inwardly.

"he said some stuff he shouldn't have, is what it boils down to." he said simply. She said nothing, clearly waiting for more. "i'm not gonna repeat what he said. but yeah. he threw his weight around, i threw my weight around, paps broke the fight up. everyone went home."

"Jackie said he punched you." she said, and she looked concerned. "I don't know whether to be concerned for you, or concerned for his hand."

"be concerned for his hand, it looked like it hurt." he said, chuckling a little.  _How can I tell her that it almost killed me? I can't tell anyone that._

"I figured. And then he just... fell down?" she asked, obviously being vague on purpose. She wasn't good at this. Sans stopped chuckling. She withdrew her hand from his, and took a long, drawn out sip from her coffee as if to make a point. She definitely had a flair for the dramatic.

"no, that wasn't it." he said. She just sat there with her big, round eyes, looking ever-so-patient. _Damnit!_ Jackie clearly didn't tell her everything. She didn't  _know. You can still walk away from this without seeming like a complete monster... you could still salvage this._ But why was this so damned important? Why was he bending over backwards to impress this  _one_ human woman? But, at the same time, he knew. God damnit all, he knew. "jesus, here i am telling you not to dance around stuff, and here i am doing fuckin' tap dance myself." He took a huge swig of his coffee, and then looked at her. "listen, can we get outta here? i can explain this better somewhere else." 

"Yeah, we can go back to my place. Or yours. Whichever."

"yours is fine. if you don't mind, that is."

"Of course not."

Sans got up with her, and the two of them headed towards the door. She began to head in the direction of their apartment, when he grabbed some of her coat to stop her from wandering off.

"nah, this way. i know a shortcut." he said shakily. Was he really doing this? Good god, he was really doing this. Was he as big of an idiot as he thought he was? Yes, he was as big of an idiot as he thought he was. What if she told everyone? What if she reported him to the police? What if she never talked to him again? Oh god, she was looking at him weird now. Fuck!  _Just keep walking Sans._

He took a sharp turn down into an alleyway, noting that no one was down there, perfect. Oh god, he was going to blow his cover.  _Oh my god, I'm a mess. I can't believe I'm doing this, what am I doing? What am I doing, what am I doing, what am I--_

"You're uh, not going to murder me, are you?" she asked, her laughter going a few octaves too high. She was obviously frightened. He looked at her, shaking his head - he couldn't back down now. Could he? Sure he could, he could pawn this off as a joke still. He had a few seconds. His eyes darted around for a second looking for a shitty pun, but he didn't see one. 

"no, no. listen, this is part of it. i'm being honest with you here."

"Here?" she gestured to the alleyway. There was a cat meowing in a fire escape. "I don't really want to talk here, if you don't mind."

"no, this is where i start being honest." he said. "just... take my hand, will you?" he said, extending his hand towards her. She hesitated, and he felt his heart drop. "trust me."

"Al-right.." she said, and she took his hand firmly, which eased his concerns. He took her down the alleyway, and as she was looking upwards he opened the doorway. He probably should have warned her not to look around, but they weren't travelling far, so he wasn't concerned about the reprocussions of it making her sick, and lead them both through it. They walked a few steps, and he gracefully placed them in front of the apartment building, making sure she didn't stumble as they exited the portal. The magic clung to her as she exited, her face agape as she adjusted to being in a new location.

"What. The. Fuck." she exclaimed, her mouth still open, staring ahead. Sans started to chuckle nervously. What had he done? He really just teleported her, didn't? This is where he fucks this timeline up, isn't it? This is where it all goes to shit, isn't it?  _You fucking moron._

"told you i knew a shortcut." he said, his voice still tilted with nervous laughter. She spun around, trying to get her bearings it seemed. She looked at Sans, behind herself, to the apartment, then back at Sans.

"What the fuck?" she repeated. She suddenly walked a few feet into the street without looking, still in a daze, and Sans grabbed her by the arm, yanking her out of the street as a taxi zoomed by blaring it's horn, narrowly missing hitting her. She raked her hand through her hair, something he noticed she did when she was stressed or nervous mostly, and began laughing maniacally. "What the fuck!" she said again. _I fucked this up._ was all Sans could think.  _I seriously fucked this one up. I'm going to be in a test tube by morning._  She looked at him with wide eyes. "I mean... what! I just. Ok! How. How!" she began to spin around again, then she shook her head. "Upstairs. Explaining."

He took her by the hand upstairs, and she took her keys out of her purse shakily, opening the door as fast as she possibly could. She pointed at her couch. "Sit. Go. Explain." she commanded. He was inwardly panicking, she didn't seem to be handling this well. He really had to nail this explanation, or it could completely go sideways. While he was staring at her, she sat down abruptly, crossing her legs and facing him like he was at the interview of his life.

"so, uh..." he started, fumbling with his words, slowly sitting down as well.

"HOLY SHIT." she cut him off. "That was CRAZY. And awesome. But crazy! What the fuck!" she exclaimed, her hands flying into the air. He leaned back, completely caught off guard by her outburst. "I mean, we were in the alley, and it smelled horrible, and then all of a sudden we're here, and that is like a what, 15 minute walk normally? And there's traffic and lights and you're like 'haha NOPE we're just gonna be home now motherfucker' and BOOM here we are and--"

_I need to calm her down._

He reached out, and gently took each arm in hand and brought them down to her sides until she looked at him in the face. He held them there, still as he could, his eyes dancing with concern for both her and himself. 

"alright there tiger, calm down. i probably should have eased you into that." he said.  _No shit. That was horribly, horribly planned._

"Whoaaaamygod. So you can teleport?" she said, and he could feel her excitement ramping up again. He needed to keep her calm about this.

"yeah, basically." he said as casually as possible. "among other things."

"SANS." she said, and tore her arms away from him to grab his shoulders and shake him slightly. "Sans. Why didn't you tell me this before? That's AWESOME. You could have saved so much cab fare!"

His face went blank.  _Really?_

She suddenly gasped. "Oh my god, you split so many cabs with me, we could have saved so much money!" Sans couldn't help but start laughing at this point.

"you find out i can teleport and that's the first thing you think of?" he rasped between his laughs. She looked positively offended.

"Well of course! I'm practical, can you blame me?" She let go of his arm, looking sheepish. "So does that mean Papyrus can teleport too?"

"what? no. no. every monster is different." Sans said. Her eyes lit up as another thought came to her.

"So you guys all have what, like a secret power or something?" she asked, dead serious. Sans rolled his eyes so hard that he thought he'd see the back of his skull.

"you're way too excited about this. kind of, yes. all monsters have some form of magic or another." he said, plainly. Didn't she watch the talk shows? He was pretty sure they discussed  _some_ of this when they came topside, but then again, a lot of humans he encountered didn't seem to know jack about any of the monsters they encounters at all. To be fair, no monster mentioned any sort of 'hidden power' per se, but it was known that every monster generally had a different magical power of some sort, and were forbidden from using any sort of "combat-ready magic" at all lest they answer to various human governments.

"So this is legit magic? So when you said you digested food that one night with magic, you weren't joking." she asked. Sans nodded.

  
"kind of." he said. "it's long and complicated, and i'd be more than happy to explain it some other time, but i'm trying to get to the important stuff here." he said, raising a browbone. While he was trying to do damage control here, he was also attempting to educate at the same time - he couldn't help it, it was his personality. He'd be vague about it today, sure, but he'd at least give her a general idea. She immediately closed her mouth, clearly interested. "so uh, basically i can do a few things with my magic other than just teleport." 

"Show me." she near whispered.  _Oh my god, this is ridiculous._

"what am i, a trick pony?" 

"Are you telling me  _nay_? Because it sounds like it." she immediately quipped. Sans abruptly grinned.  _Give the lady what she wants._

"you asked for it." he said. With a small intake of breath, he concentrated, pulling from the calm place in his center. He looked up at her, feeling the magic around his body stirring, condensing and jumping to his will. It slithered from around his body and out his hand that he slowly extended - and he pointed it at her. With a simple thought, it bridged the gap, jumping from his hand to her, and lifted her off the ground like she was mere paper.

"Whaaaaaat!?" she shouted, looking below her, clearly impressed. He flicked his hand lazily to the right, the magic trailing off of it like a loose leash. She slowly drifted with it, since he didn't want her to go too fast anyway. She seemed to be biting her knuckles - was she suppressing giddiness or a scream of terror? He needed to put her down, she wasn't saying anything. He carefully moved his hand back in towards himself, retracting what magic he had extended towards her and back into himself, and she plopped softly back onto the couch. The small surge of magic in the room vanished, leaving a faint smell of aether hanging in the air - although the human certainly wouldn't smell it. She raked her hand through her hair, her mouth once again hanging open like a codfish.

Sans was studying her as she sat there processing what just happened, trying to read her body language. _Was_ she scared? Was that too much? That might have been too much. He needed to say something, to ease the tension, something to --

"THAT WAS AWESOME." she said, jumping up and leaning into him, grabbing his shoulders once more. He felt his smile twitch involuntarily. "I'm sorry, I'm sorry! Oh my god. Oh my god! I've never... that was just... wow!" she said, her eyes darting back and forth as she was processing what just happened. He watched as a series of expressions flitted across her face, and then slowly she looked up to him, her face extremely serious - and a tinge sad. 

 "Alright. I'm done freaking out. I'm guessing Will experienced that, but in the other direction." she said. Sans blinked a few times, not really expecting her to make the connection, but nodded. She sighed, then rubbed the back of her neck.

"look..." he started, not wanting it to scare her.

"Can you kill someone with that?" she shot out. Sans blinked. He paused.  _I need to choose my words carefully._

"i won't sugar coat it. i could. but i'd have to be really trying." he said, trying not to skirt the truth. "but if you threw a man off a cliff, they'd die just the same."

"So what you did to him wouldn't have killed him, it was basically just holding him down, right?" she asked, her voice almost pleading. Sans sucked in a breath, and resisted pinching the bridge of his nose.

"it wouldn't have killed him, no. i'm not a murderer." he lied. 

She let out a huge puff of air, as she seemed to be holding her breath while waiting for the answer.  _I can't even be honest while I'm 'being honest'. What a great guy I am._ But how could he tell her? None of it would make sense, anyway. They both sat in silence for a moment.

"Have you ever killed a man, though?" she suddenly asked, catching him off guard. Sans could feel him retreating into himself.

"no." he partially lied, once more.  _Just a child. Another monster. A sick, twisted abomination._ He knew her answer was asking if he had ever killed, but he wasn't about to admit he killed a child potentially hundreds of times.

He realized that his body had gone rigid, just recalling it, and relaxed himself. He let out as smooth a laugh as he could. "jeez, we're called monsters, not murderers." he quipped.

"Well I mean, you do have fucking magical powers. I'd probably chokeslam a bitch just for cutting me in line." she said, smirking. Sans laughed at this.

"and this is why you don't have powers. probably a good thing." he said. The two of them smiled at each other, and she began to visibly relax.

"I'm glad we talked. I was being an idiot. I'll be honest with you Sans, I was worried I had fucked things up." she said, giving him a sheepish smile.

"didn't you get my note?" he asked, tilting his head slightly. He  _knew_ it made it onto her patio.

"What note?" she questioned, confused.

"i put a note on your door that night, because i felt like i had messed up too." he said, picking at a piece of fabric on his jacket to avoid looking at her. "then i saw your lights on your porch, so i tossed you another one. kinda stupid, i guess."

"Wait, that was you?" she asked. "The hell was it? Like a weird triangle thing?" Sans groaned, and shook his head.

"that was the best drawing i could muster of the state of idaho. i'm not a gifted artist." he said, putting his hands out in defeat.

She looked at him for a moment, then burst into laughter. He crossed his arms, looking perturbed, as she continued to laugh.

"Oh my god, that was IDAHO?" she said. "I thought the Illuminati was trying to give me mixed messages." she said sarcastically, grinning at him. He glared at her.

"i need the shut up pillow right now." he said obstinately. She began to do that snort-giggle that she did when she was trying to suppress her laughter too hard. Sans looked around at anything but her to try and break away from his embarrassment, when he noticed the flowers on her table. "pretty." he said before he could stop himself, his head nodding towards them. He knew they were from Will - who else would they be from? "where'd those come from?" he asked anyway. She glanced to see what he was talking about, and bit her lip. 

"Will." she huffed. "His way of apology." Sans leaned back onto the couch, wishing he could just sink into it and never come back out.

"someone DID tell me that they'd give me an explanation..." he said, raising a browbone. 

You want it NOW?" she whined. He inwardly chuckled, they might as well both be miserable.

"what better time than now?" he said, grinning. "c'mon, i just showed you how thoroughly magical i can be, it's only fair." She let out an overly dramatic moan, rolling her eyes up towards the ceiling.

"Fine, fine." she said, and she exhaled heavily. "I'd say I need a drink, but I think I'm done with alcohol for the rest of the year." Sans chuckled at that, giving a small nod.

"probably a wise choice for both of us." he said.

"So, jesus, where do I start?" she said, plopping back onto one of her pillows, rearranging her body to face him. "I've known Will  _forever_. Since the beginning of college. We lived in the same dorm, and we pretty much immediately hit it off. And every since then, I've been chasing him like a lost puppy dog, trying to get good with him."

"what do you mean?" Sans asked.

"Oh, you know the old stories. Unrequited love, or something like that. I dunno. I've had a raging hard on for this guy ever since I met him, pretty much. But no matter what, we've never synched up relationship-wise. He's pretty much serial-dated, and the one time he was single for enough time for me to do anything, I was seeing someone." She laughed bitterly. "I even broke up with the guy, only to have Will saddle up with someone in the meantime. Sounds pathetic, I know." Sans frowned.

"nah. i know the feeling of caring about someone who's onto someone else." he said, and he meant it. He had had a brief heartache in the past, something only fueled by the fact that he had spent so long getting to know a person locked behind a door, only to keep his trademark grin and watch them move on in the end.

"Yeah? Then you probably know how fucking frustrating it is when they're still in your life." she said, stretching a leg out, bumping into his. "Whoop, sorry."

"s'fine. get comfy." he said.

"Fine. I will. My house, s'up." she said, and pointedly stretched both her legs out into his lap. He shrugged, but internally he was savouring the contact he was having with her. It wasn't a sexual touch, but a comfortable one. Here was this girl, who he just teleported and dangled in the air, now casually stretching out over him and sharing her life with him.  _This is what it is, Sans._ he told himself.  _You both feel comfortable around each other. There's no pretenses._  "Anyway," she continued, "the explanation part of it is, even though I recognize this - I kinda still fall for it I guess, in hopes something will change... Will likes having me around. I dunno. As backup."

"backup?" Sans asked, placing a hand on her leg to get himself comfortable as well.

"Yeah. So like, if things go south with his latest girlfriend, I'm the backup girlfriend." Sans barely contained an eyeroll.

"i thought you said you didn't date though?"

"We don't." she said curtly. "He comes to my house in the middle of the night, all weepy and mopey, and for maybe about a week I get to have the best sex of my life and --" Sans contained a snarl - his head rattled with the _bullshit_ he heard in his overlap. She paused. "If I'm getting a little too TMI here, tell me man." He looked at her, the lights in his eyes extremely dim, almost out.

"you're fine. continue." he said, realizing her had accidentally gripped her leg. "i think i know where this is going."

"Yeah. He tells me how great I am, how much he loves me, and how we're meant to be... then a week later he's moved onto his newest girlfriend. It's like some sort of weird, yearly orbital rotation. I should start marking this shit on my calendar." She laughed, but it was hollow sounding.

"why do you stay friends with him?" Sans asked. She shrugged. He still knew.

"I dunno. We've been friends for years. Other than this weird thing we got going on, as a friend, he's really cool." she said. "He's reliable in a crisis, he treats his friends like gold, he'll always honour a favour... he's not a complete ass. It's just as much my fault as it is his, really." Sans didn't say anything to that. "If I didn't chase him so much, maybe he'd chase me. Or maybe we'd stop chasing each other altogether."

"looked like he was chasing you the other night." Sans said a little gruffer than he intended.

"What exactly did you hear?" she asked.

"most of it." he said, not adding more. Her face flushed. "but you'd have to be an idiot not to pick up on the body language. for  _either_  of you." Her eyebrows shot up, and she began to fidget with her hands.

"Well, he's not in a break-up phase, the moon cycle isn't right." She said, her voice lilting. "Plus... I really should stop this shit anyway. I've known it for a while, it's just getting worse. He's just messing with me lately." She laughed. "I dunno about you monsters, but us humans get extremely desperate." Sans patted her leg in a empathetic manner.

  
"it happens to the best of us." he said. She had  _no_ idea. Good  _god_ she had no idea. 

"Yeah well, that's what toy--" she paused. He looked at her, waiting for her to finish.  "--tal isolation is for."  _What was she going to say? I'm missing something here_ _._ Sans thought to himself. She looked embarrassed, so he decided to lighten the mood.

"don't recommend it, being a hermit makes you incredibly shellfish." he quipped.

"I WILL get the Shut Up Pillow." she said, raising a brow.

"i feel like this is a challenge."

"Please no. I want to continue to like you." she whined, kicking at him a little with one of her legs. He laughed.

"alright, alright. i'm gonna take off before i say something else  _punny_." He started to get up, but she locked him down with her legs. "what?"

  
"I will ruin you." she said. He started to say something when she shifted, and came at him like some sort of human sized boulder, rolling on top of him practically. Clearly his puns had pushed her over the edge - she reached out under his hoodie, and her hands came into contact with his upper ribs. _Oh god! Even through the shirt...!_ He let out a cry, both confused and pleased, and she flopped back, her face plastered with concern. They stared at each other for a time.

"is that how you wanna play it?" he asked with a sly grin. She didn't know how good it felt. Was it bad of him? I mean, as long as she didn't get _under_ the shirt, it's not like it was anything dirty, right? 

"Pfft, bring it on." She wiggled her fingers and eyebrows, daring him to come at her. Alright, she wanted to play, did she? He lazily opened a doorway behind him, falling into it with ease, falling back onto the sofa behind her, his mouth by her neck. He was so close, he could practically taste her skin, he just wanted to sink his teeth in... 

"i think you made a mistake." he whispered, and then he shot his hands out, gripping into her side, tickling her like crazy. She threw her head back, shrieking with laughter, trying to wrench away. She fought dirty as hell, digging her elbow into his head to get him away from her, finally pushing it into the couch and getting back to his own sides and began tickling him as she laughed. Sans felt an electric shock shoot through him, and his body was sending a jumble of mixed messages, both pleasurable but more uncomfortable,  _actually ticklish_. He began to start laughing, trying to get back at her, and with time the two of them became a gasping mess of stupidity.

"Ok! Ok! I yield! I'm gonna pee my pants!" she cried out, holding his wrist above her head in defeat. He was breathing heavy, a grin plastered across his face. "Mistakes were made! You reign champion. Oh my god. Never again." Sans laughed, bonking his forehead against hers and resting it there.

"good, because i was getting tired.  _bone-tired_  in fact." he said, his grin turning into a shit-eating one. She practically shrieked.

"I will END you!" she shouted, and shoved him back away from her, panting still from the exhaustion. The two of them looked at each other, then she just started giggling. Sans laughed. "I'll be right back, I seriously have to pee now." She got up and headed into the bathroom, and Sans flopped onto his back, catching his breath and staring at the ceiling for a moment. Did that really just happen? That is so uncharacteristically like him. 

He dragged a hand over his face as he processed this. He got himself up off the floor, and went to stand by the door, waiting for her to come out. He remember something, as she exited the bathroom and came over to him.

"papyrus said you weren't coming over tomorrow for spaghetti night... that still true?" he asked. She shook her head.

"That was me being a freaking idiot. Methinks we made up." she said, her smile lighting up her face. "We're kinda stupid like that, you and I."

"you're the only person i know who can get me to do that." he said gesturing to the couch, but he could feel a blush creeping up onto it.  _Stop that, damnit!_

"What, forcefully win a tickle fight through blatant cheating? Yeah, good on you asshat." she snarked, putting her hands on her hips. She stood there for a moment, then said, "Hey, honestly though. And this I mean. I'm handsy. I'm shitty with personal space, since we're being honest with each other. I don't want you to ever feel uncomfortable around me... so just tell me if I'm crossing a line." Sans chortled.

"shouldn't that be my line?" he asked. "you're fine. same goes for you. but let's cool it on those fights, they're  _tickling my funny bone_."

" **GET OUT**." she said, in mock anger.

"sheesh! sheesh! alright, alright, see you tomorrow." he said, rolling his eyes dramatically. He locked the door behind him as he left, and unlocked his own door to his place. Papyrus wasn't home just yet, and he had some time to himself. He kicked his shoes off, and headed into his bedroom, shutting the door behind himself. He never did get those bolts, damnit. Looking at his clock, there was still time.

He touched his ribs gingerly, the feeling of her still lingering. There was also still time for  _that_.... 

Nah, he thought. A lot just happened, and he wasn't about to throw a bought of lust back into the mix. He was confused enough about his feelings. Although, to be fair, lust is a pretty simple emotion, he thought. No, he was going to go get those bolts, and get started on that project. Things were alright now, so why not? 

Sans put his shoes  _back_ on, something that made him grumble at internally, throwing his hoodie back on as well, and headed back out into the cold air. He knew for a fact he never finished this project, regardless of it just being a fun experiment of sorts in other iterations. 

And this time, he _would_.

**Author's Note:**

> SO.  
> PLEASE LET ME KNOW IF YOU HAVE ANY FEEDBACK. I need it! This is a companion story with his POV, and I decided not to utilize the "you" phrase - if it's honestly from his view, then it'd be "her/she" pronouns. But if it's jarring or otherwise, let me know!


End file.
